


A New Adventure Sans the Determination

by ShadowBlade40



Category: Naruto, Undertale
Genre: Crossover, Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-28
Updated: 2017-10-02
Packaged: 2018-07-18 21:02:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 34,481
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7330564
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShadowBlade40/pseuds/ShadowBlade40
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>While on a mission an ANBU team lead by Inu hears word of a demon lurking in a nearby mountain. Intrigued by the rumor, they head out to find the truth. Inside the cave is something that no one expected, something... pun-bearable... I'm sorry...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Meeting the Skele-pun Master

In a dense forest we can see a group of four people, three males: one female, dashing through the foliage, using the branches as a springboard for each jump between trees. The group all wore similar outfits with black, sleeveless shirts, black pants that were confined at the bottom with mid-calf high, black sandals. They all wore black, elbow-length gloves with metal arm-guards over them and a red spiral tattoo on their upper-arms. But most interesting of all their outfit choices were the masks that adorned their faces, each individual mask had a separate design.

One male, who had short brown hair, wore a mask that resembled a cat, and had green and red markings adorning it; the next male had short black hair that he kept in a low pony tail, and wore a porcelain mask that resembled a weasel with three triangular markings, one on each ear and one at the forehead; the lone woman of the group also wore a cat mask, but unlike her male companion her mask held three red stripes, one on each cheek and another on her forehead, the bangs from her beautiful purple hair fell over the front of the mask while the sides of her bangs framed it; the final man was quite the sight, he wore a dog themed mask with four red markings on its cheeks and its eyes lined with red, but this is not what made him stand out, no; on the dog masked-man’s head was the most random and comical sight one could behold, on his head was silver, gravity defying hair.

These were ANBU operatives Tenzo, Itachi, Neku, and Inu respectively, together they formed the entirety of Team Ro, one of the most well respected ANBU teams. They had been sent by their leader, The Third Hokage: Hiruzen Sarutobi, to Kusagakure for a mission that had quickly escalated into a newer, more dangerous mission. At first it was a simple mission to stop some saboteurs from bombing Kusagakure via bomb tags hidden under the streets. However, while near Kusagakure, they had heard some rather strange rumors while undercover; apparently there are some rumors circulating about a cave in a nearby mountain that holds a demon. This would normally never get the attention of an ANBU unit, however several factors make this rather odd occurrence. Firstly, Kusagakure had no known Jinchuriki, or holders of biju, which are the most commonly known demon. Secondly, this is no where near Oni No Kuni or Numa No Kuni, so that would rule out Moryo, the demon trapped in Numa No Kuni’s mountain. Finally, Orochimaru has been spotted here recently, so the chances of this being some abomination made by him is high. They still couldn’t rule out that Kusagakure could have stolen a Jinchuriki; after all, a hidden village would never admit losing its biju, that could make them a giant target, especially minor villages.

With all these factors, they couldn’t stand idle, so they contacted the Hokage and he gave them the green light; sadly though, he could not send reinforcements, so they had to be extra cautious; even if they were some of the best ANBU in history, this mission had so many variables that it could go south faster than Shisui could do a mile.

Inu, the acting leader of Team Ro, quickly made a few short hand signals. The others nodded their heads in understanding and began to slow down, in a few minutes they came across a clearing and settled next to some foliage for cover while Inu began to bring out a map of Heiya No Kuni, the country that Kusa resides in. Seeing that he had their attention Inu began to address his squad.

“Before we go running in like some green-horn genin, we need to quickly address the situation.” Inu began, his voice seemingly quite lazy, but held a firm and powerful undertone. “From what we have gathered thus-far, we can narrow down the possibilities down to a select few; sadly for us, none of these possibilities will end cleanly. The first potential scenario is that this ‘demon’ they are talking of all around Kusa, is one of Orochimaru’s experiments. This leads to a couple potential risks by itself, Orochimaru or one his hideouts might be there, meaning we will have a rather large battle on our hands. In this case the best possible outcome is to distract for long enough to contact the Hokage and let him know of the existence of Orochimaru’s hideout.”

The team nodded in confirmation with his analysis of the situation, then Neko, the female member, spoke up, “I shall prepare not only a messenger bird for the Hokage, but also for any other close by ally of Konoha, or a country that has a bingo book entry for Orochimaru, just in case.”

Inu nodded his head in response, “Yes, Neko, get all that prepared, but also prepare plenty of medical supplies, and body seals. Now, our next scenario: if we find out that Kusa has indeed stolen a Jinchuriki from another nation we need to follow a very strict set of rules, or this could end in a new Great Ninja War.” The squad shuddered in remembrance of the horrid wars, not many people who were there to take part would forget the events that unfolded. “We must eliminate all, sans the hostage. From there we will seal up the bodies of the deceased in a special disposal scroll, which will be carried by both Neko and I,” to showcase what he meant he pulled out a white scroll with several lines written on it in hiragana, with a giant kanji representing the word ‘erase’ on the side. These were special disposal scrolls that worked a little bit differently than most, unlike other disposal scrolls that released all contents upon destruction, this special scroll would keep all contents locked into a pocket dimension even after the seal was destroyed, ergo whatever was inside the scroll was lost forever.

“Upon confirmation of the elimination of those residing in the mountain, we will have Tenzo use his wood release to keep the Jinchuriki confined until mission success. After that, we will destroy the mountain that the ninja were holed up in with minor explosive tags in key position, to create a faux cave-in, so that we will be able to conceal any evidence of Konoha’s involvement. Normally we would have Tenzo use his earth release to do this, but in this situation with the fact that Kusa has many sensors; we will not be able to create a cave-in with jutsu, it would leave behind a very large mark, and Kusa will be able to claim that some ninja have caused wide-spread damage to their country, which will launch an investigation amongst the Daimyos’ courts and lead directly to Konoha.”

It was a lot to cover, especially for something that has such a low chance of occurring, but they had to be ready for the worst. They were no longer dealing with a small village, they were dealing with a chance at a world war, one they wanted no part in.

Finally, they were on the last scenario, “Now the last possible outcome,” Inu said as the other four operative began to seem a little on edge, “This is the most outrageous and unlikely of the options so far, but also the most dangerous, not in a political sense but in a battle sense. Demons are a very rare occurrence here in the elemental nations, and as such not much is known about them, aside from they are by far the most powerful creatures one can find. I am sure we have all been to Oni no Kuni and as such have had the opportunity to learn about Moryo, a powerful demon that is sealed in the mountains of Numa no Kuni, he is but one example of a demon that exists outside of the group of Biju. There may be even more demons out there in the world, but they are very rare, and as such, we have never had the opportunity to study more demons. With the only example of demons being the Biju and Moryo, that sets the standard power of demons very high; so high, in fact, that should we encounter a demon, we will no choice but to flee and hope that either it is trapped to the mountain, or that we have enough time to send a carrier bird and receive reinforcements.” Inu concluded with a sigh, as he seemed rather winded from the speech. His team was taking time to soak in all the information, when suddenly Tenzo posed a question.

“Inu-senpai, with the demon theory, would it be far fetched to assume that, since I have Wood release, wouldn’t I be able to subdue the demon before any major catastrophe, even if at least for a little while?” Inu put a hand to his chin and thought of a response, before talking in a very tired tone.

“Normally that would work for a Jinchuriki, however, your Wood release is not as good as Lord First’s, and as such, I have no inkling if that would work or fail if used on a biju, let alone a demon of unknown caliber. It wouldn’t hurt to give it a shot, but we cannot rely on it working, we need to quickly formulate a plan of action to counteract anything that may go wrong.” Inu finished before pulling out a map and began to form a strategy for all the scenarios they had just covered. They had eventually decided that Itachi would go in first under a genjutsu to quickly scope the area out, once properly examined he would relay back to the group. Then, Tenzo and Neko would follow Itachi and once inside scatter to cover more grounds, should an emergency happen they were to flare their chakra and Inu would come quickly to assist them, as he was the assassination expert of the team. The situation that they encountered inside the mountain would determine what steps they would take after scoping the place out.  
Happy with their newly formed plan, the ANBU squad set out to fulfill their impromptu mission.

* * *

 

Meanwhile in a dark cave, one could make out a giant figure of a monstrous black widow spider, which was also surrounded by smaller black widows, and lying on the back of its abdomen was a skeleton with a white tee-shirt and blue overcoat that had tanned fur trim on the hood, which was kept down. Five badges were on the skeletons jacket, one badge, placed on the left breast of the jacket, was circular with wings and below it were three triangle badges, one pointed up two pointed down, the last badge was on the other side of the jacket, it was a mostly white badge with dark gray and yellow borders, the badge held a blue lightning bolt and on the white was a small globe. The skeleton also wore black pants that were obviously well pressed as a seem could be identified on the front; the skeleton’s feet were covered in blue fuzzy slippers. If one were to look at the skeleton’s face, nobody would be able to miss the gigantic toothy smile that the skeleton had; strangely though the skeleton’s eye-sockets were closed, as if asleep.

Suddenly, the silence was broken by a high pitched voice calling out, “Sans, wake up you lazy bones!”

The skeleton began to stir as a low groan was heard, “Flowey, do I have to move?” The voice was very mellow sounding and lazily toned. The skeleton began to sit up from its laid down position, “*sigh* fine, I’m awake, what’s the emergency?” The skeleton brought a boney hand up to his constantly smiling mouth as if feigning a yawn, its eye-sockets slowly began to open revealing a pitch black abyss with two white dot, one in each eye. It then looked over to the side and saw a giant daisy surrounded by small black widow spiders, sans one larger black widow that was nearly the size of a small dog, on the carpel of the flower was a face with two large eyes and a mouth; the flower looked very agitated.

“Sans, can you please help me with these goddamn spiders!?” the newly named Flowey asked.

The skeleton, who we now know as Sans, took up a thinking position, “Ya’ know, if you were a little bit nicer, maybe they wouldn’t give you so much trouble.” he said in a very bored tone. However, his advise seemed to only agitate the flower more.

“Maybe I would be more nice, if I wasn’t the only one playing babysitter for a group of arachnids, not to mention, I wasn’t the one who decided that we would be their guardians.” At this point Sans began to lay down on his side with his eye-sockets half lidded. Noting this, Flowey let out a sigh and asked in a pleading tone, “Can you at least get the princess of my back for a while?”

Sans let out a small chuckle as he stood up, jumped of the giant spider and landed on his feet. Walking over to Flowey, Sans responded with a nod, “Sure thing Flowey, I wouldn’t mind giving ya a hand.” Once next to the flower he reach for his right hand with his left, and pulled it off with a *pop*, and held it out for the flower.

“Sans, this isn’t a joke!” Flowey growled angrily, as its carpel began to turn red with anger.

In response, Sans let out a little laugh, “Come on, Flowey, didn’t that tickle your funny bone?”  
*growl*

“… Ok fine, I’ll stop,” Sans said in a saddened tone as he put his hand back where it was supposed to be, he quickly became more upbeat as he looked at the largest spider amongst the group, “now, come on, Muffet.” The large spider looked at him for a couple seconds than proceeded to crawl up his legs and back before resting on his head.

“I still can’t believe you wanted to name her after that woman.” Flowey stated while looking at the spider on Sans’ head, “Though, considering how much of a pain in the roots she is, I guess it fits.”

Sans put his left hand in his pocket as his other hand went up and began to pet Muffet, “She wasn’t that bad Flowey.”

Flowey let loose a huff as it leaned forward, and narrowed its eyes in remembrance of the spider woman that used to inhabit the underground, “She was a scam artist, not to mention terrible at her job.”

“Well that second point isn’t really fair now is it? After all, didn’t you lose to Frisk too?”

Flowey’s head quickly fell near the floor, its tone of voice quickly took up a sound of shame, “Don’t remind me of that, I don’t want to remember having to grovel at a human’s feet. It’s bad enough that I had to live through it once.”

Wherever the conversation was going was quickly cut off when Flowey’s head shot up, “Sans, there are four individuals of unidentified LOVE levels coming here at a very quick rate.” Sans quickly pulled his hands out of his pockets, and motioned all the young spiders back to the queen that lay in the center of the cave. He turned back to the flower who had its eyes closed and was concentrating, “They are hiding their LOVE rather well, however I can still sense their rather high EXP. I can tell that if they don’t like what they find here, than they can and will resort to violence.”

Sans narrowed his eye-sockets at this information, four individuals of unknown LOVE was certainly a potential problem, but knowing that they had very high EXP was even worse, they knew how to kill and would be able to do it again. He looked towards Flowey, who was still stationary, “What else can you identify about them?”

“They are all human, but have ridiculous amounts of mana, much higher than most humans we’ve seen. I can also tell that they are accustomed to it, as they are using it to leap between trees. Also, they have a medium sized blade on their back and a pouch on their legs that may contain more weapons.” Sans began to take in all the information Flowey gave him, as he reached his hand up cupping his chin.

“Okay… I think I have a plan,” he began, as Flowey’s eyes opened and it looked at Sans with its head tilted. “I will lay out, and hopefully they will pass over me, thinking I’m just an old corpse, as soon as they get past me, I want you to set a barrier so no one can get in or out. Afterward, I will engage them, and should they prove to be hostile, I will be forced to attack them, and trust me, I won’t take it easy at the start like I did with Frisk.” At this point Flowey’s demeanor began to get a lot more somber and worried.

“What if these humans have enough determination to do things similar to Frisk? You could barely handle one. I don’t want to lose anyone else...” Flowey’s voice trailed off into a sad mumble, as it began to wilt forward; Flowey was quickly brought back to reality when Sans put his hand on Flowey’s head and ruffled its petals, like one would do to a child’s hair.

“Don’t worry, Flowey. After all, with you lying in wait, they’ll have no idea what hit ‘em! You’re our ace in the hole, after all.” Sans’ cheerful nature became absolutely contagious, and soon a huge toothy smile spread across Flowey’s face.

“Ya! And even if that failed, we’re impossible to beat if we do our special combo!”

Sans quickly got off his knees and pointed to the entrance of the cave triumphantly, “That’s the spirit, Flowey! Now quickly, fetch Papyrus’ scarf, I want to look my Sunday best, or at least my Tuesday pretty-good.” He said as Flowey nodded and burrowed underground to get his brother’s scarf. It might not have any purpose in the fight itself, but it did make him feel better knowing he was carrying his brother’s will, literally on his shoulders. As soon as Flowey returned, Sans quickly put the tattered, red scarf on and proceeded to give more orders. “Your Majesty, please relocate to your nest at the top of the cave with all of your subjects. Flowey prepare your mana for the barrier, and make sure your souls are ready to go.” With everything set, the show is about to start.

* * *

 

The squad was drawing close to the unnamed mountain that housed their target, whatever it may be. Everyone had chosen to remain silent throughout the trek there, but Inu was currently going through many thoughts; he just couldn’t quite shake the feeling of immense foreboding he was feeling, somehow he just knew that this situation would go south and he didn’t have a say in the matter. ‘There just has to be more to this situation than we are being told, there’s no way that a demon just appeared here, so this either must be something that was known for a long time and just came to light, or it is something else entirely; no matter what the outcome is, I highly doubt that any of us will be the same after what we encounter.’ His thoughts were cut short when he notice that they were almost at their destination. Inu held out his hand, open palmed, signaling everyone to stop and quickly looked towards Itachi and made a hand motion towards him. Itachi quickly nodded and made the ram hand sign as he melded away, as he was using genjutsu to make him nearly invisible. Inu followed up by giving similar signals to the other ANBU operatives, who quickly took up areas near the entrance.

“There appears to be no entities in the first area, Tenzo, Neko, you may proceed.” Inu heard Itachi’s hushed voice come over the small radio earpiece. Neko and Tenzo blurred into shadow as they rushed inside. Inu was having a very hard time concentrating now, because the ominous feeling he was have earlier had just come back in full stride, only to be brought back to reality when something he hadn’t planned upon had happened. His team’s chakra signature had suddenly vanished!

Itachi, who had just entered the cave, was scoping the area under his camouflage genjutsu. At the entrance of the cave was a skeleton, which in and of itself was a tad worrying, but there were several things wrong with the skeleton. Firstly, it had no flesh anywhere on its bones, nor any cobwebs, that would mean that someone or something else is here. The second thing that worried him was the skeleton’s outfit, it wore a large coat and scarf, which no one who lived in a humid area, like Kusa, would ever wear. He quickly scanned through the rest of the cave entrance, which was rather bland as it was just a simple rock cave with a few stalactites and stalagmites strewn about. However, at the rear of the cave was a small opening that, upon inspection, was blocked off by a barrier.

Not seeing anything that could be considered a threat in sight, he stopped to call in Neko and Tenzo, mostly because Neko was the expert with barriers and other seals. Even though he found nothing of suspicion, Itachi still didn’t want to push his luck with sending a chakra flare or being otherwise loud, so he whispered into the mic of his earpiece, “There appears to be no entities in the first area, Tenzo, Neko, you may proceed.”

Within a few seconds the two operatives that he called for appeared next to him. Tenzo being the first to speak up, “What have you found Itachi?”

Itachi, who had let up his genjutsu by this point, motioned through the cave and began to relay his assessment of the situation, “There is nothing in this room that is of significance, sans the occasional spider and that odd skeleton near the entrance. However, if you will direct your attention towards the dark shadows of the room, you can make out a small opening, big enough for a human. As I went to investigate it, I noticed a barrier made of chakra.” Itachi paused in his speech to allow his fellow ANBU to think about this new development.

“So, from what I’m gathering, this chamber is a false room; an entrance hidden in plain site.” Tenzo stated with Itachi nodding in response.  
“Yes, as far as I can tell… It seems that someone doesn’t want anyone to proceed further; that’s why I called you two in here. Neko, you are our barrier and seals expert, so I would like for you to take a look at it.”

Neko gave a small grunt of approval before reaching into her pouch, “Of course Itachi-senpai, give me a second to-”

Suddenly, they conversation was cut off when a new voice sounded, “Now, now… You can’t just come in here destroying someones barriers willy-nilly, you should at least buy them dinner first.” The group quickly took a triangular formation, searching for the entity that evaded their detection. Itachi, who was facing the entrance, gasped when he saw what talked to them. His gasp prompted the other members of their squad to look towards the entrance, only to recoil in shock at the figure in front of them. “What’s wrong… You look like you just saw a ghost…” The voice was coming from the skeleton that had previously laid limp near the cave opening, who was now standing up. The skeleton’s face had changed drastically, a large, toothy grin was spread across it, and the skeleton’s eye-sockets held a white dot in each eye.

“I guess that because you are my guests, I should introduce myself first… My name is Sans the Ske-” Before Sans could finish his intro the weasel masked ANBU leaped at Sans with his weapon drawn, revealing it to be a tanto, a single-sided short-sword. As the blade inched closer Sans lowered his head, shadowing his eyes to the onlooking ANBU, and, with grace higher than anyone expected, he side stepped so that the blade had missed his clothes by millimeters.

Seeing his attack miss, Itachi quickly corrected himself, shifting his momentum so that he was no longer going forward and swung his sword horizontally, in hopes to catch the skeleton off guard.

His efforts in vain, as Sans ducked underneath the slash, while doing the splits, and used his arms as pivots to swing his legs in a sweeping motion. His attack forced the ANBU to jump in the air to avoid the attack, which is exactly what Sans wanted. Sans, still in the splits, moved one arm up and spun his body in a move that one would find in a break dance video, ending with his body vertical with his hands on the ground; he then used his arms as springboards to launch towards the airborne ANBU, kicking him in the abdomen, causing spittle to fly from his mouth as the wind was knocked out of him. Sans didn’t relent in his assault, hooking his foot under the flak jacked Itachi wore and began to pull, while in tandem pushing his chest forward and cocking his closed fist backwards, preparing for a devastating punch.

As the fist rushed forward, Itachi was forced to watch every second as his sharingan slowed down the action, but he was unable to do anything as his body was still reeling from the kick he had just received not even a second ago. And sure enough it struck, causing Itachi’s limp body to go flying, as the porcelain mask he wore shattered, revealing half of his face. He had larger than average eyelashes, and handsome facial structure with little baby fat; what stood out most about his face though was the rather large tear trough that ran under his eye.

As his body was about to his the wall of the cavern, his purple haired team mate caught him mid-air and landed in a crouch; she quickly gave him a once over before the skeleton’s voice rang through the air. “You humans really like to cut us skeletons off during our intros… All I wanted to do was introduce myself, look cool, maybe even come to a peaceful alternative to you invading my home…” At this this point Sans raised his head up from its lowered position showing his brows furrowed in anger and the white dots in his eyes gone, creating quite the imposing visage. “But no, you have to attack at first sight and make everything so much more difficult… Well guess what, you aren’t the first humans I’ve fought, and if I learned one thing, it’s that you all have the survivability of cockroaches. But, that just means,” a dark blue aura began to resonate around the skeleton, and an iris rolled forward in the skeletons head, the iris sharing the blue hue of the power that was being emanated, “I’ll just have to stomp harder!”

Tenzo, who had pulled out his own tanto in a backhanded defensive position, began to sweat under the intense power the skeleton was releasing, he began to yell at Neko without turning his head from his opponent, “Neko, is Itachi battle ready?!”

His answer came from Itachi as he groaned while trying to stand up, “Yeah… I’m okay, Tenzo. Despite not having any muscle, his punches hold a lot of weight, more so than most jonins, and his speed, I don’t know where to start...”

Sans, unable to help himself, said, “I think a great place to start would be to stop masking you strength, or else you’re boned!” He let loose a chuckle, no matter how serious the situation, he always had time for puns.

Sadly, his puns were ignored by the ANBU, in favor of continuing their conversation. “And with all this power he is flexing, I’m surprised Inu-taicho hasn’t come to investigate.” Itachi looked towards Neko, “Have you any luck contacting Inu-taicho?”

Neko who was still kneeled, let out a slight growl, “No he isn’t answering the radio and all I’m hearing is static. Also, I’ve noticed that his chakra sign is gone.”

Itachi grit his teeth at this news, that would mean either Inu was eliminated or they had a barrier surrounding them… either way, they were going to have a bad time.


	2. Bare-Bones Battles

Itachi was currently racking his brain with the news that Neko just gave him. _‘Inu-taicho’s sign is gone, that would mean that he was either KIA or someone has created a chakra barrier around us...’_ Itachi closed his eyes as he took a second to mull over the facts and circumstances of the situation, _‘Inu-taicho couldn’t have been killed, as even if he was assassinated, we would have felt a power surge in his general direction…’_

As Itachi asked himself that question, Sans decided that this would the moment he chimed in, “You do realize that combat isn’t turn based, right?” Sans’ voice was very bored and at the same time amused. “You shouldn’t just stand there analyzing the situation, especially given the fact that I just decked you, after you swung first.” Sans began to rub the back of his head and sighed before continuing, “But I fully understand, anime rules and all that jazz… it’s kinda bullshit but, since I’m here already I guess I should do my part in the ‘Stupid Anime Dialogue Cycle™’...”

Sans raised his right hand, which he had turned into a fist, and feigned a cough, as if to gain their attention, even though he already had it. “As the quote unquote ‘villain’ of the situation it is up to me to give you the initiative to defeat me… So, as you have no doubt guessed we are surrounded by a barrier that blocks anything from coming in or going out, which is why you can’t detect this ‘Inu’ person and is also why your radio won’t work. However, I bet you’re still wondering about one question...” The members of Team Ro leaned forward, the beginning gibberish he was spouting made no matter to them, however they were interested in this new insight he would give them, “’How did he make that barrier if he never flexed the power necessary to make it?’… well am I right?”

This question made the squad stop in their track, they had been working under the assumption that it was the skeleton that had raised the barrier. _‘Despite the way the skeleton portrays himself, it is obvious he’s no idiot… So he wouldn’t bring up such a question if the answer was known, meaning him creating the barrier is false… But if he didn’t make it...'_ a brief flash of fear rippled through the ANBUs.

Seeing the big strong ‘heroes’ shaken like that brought a hollow chuckle out of Sans’ ever constant smile, “I see you’ve figured it out… So, care to share with the readers at home?” Sans asked breaking the forth wall, sadly though the ANBU didn’t respond to him causing him to sigh and slump forward cartoonishly, “You all are no fun… Fine if you won’t say it, than I will, I’m not working alone.” With this new information shared, Sans raised himself back up and put his hands back inside of his coat pockets. “So, with that out of the way… I believe we’ve had enough show and tell, don’cha think? And since I’m such a nice guy, I will allow you three to have the first attack, and we’ll go from there.”  
Itachi looked over at his fellow ANBU, “Neko, follow my lead! Tenzo, provide support to us, and if the opportunity presents itself, I want you to attempt a capture!”

“Hai, Itachi!” both shouted in response. Neko raised her tanto in a forward held position, while Tenzo knelt on one knee and put his hands together with his fingers interlocked.

Itachi began to quickly go through several odd signs with his hands at an incredible rate, until he stopped with his hands connected with his ring and pinky fingers interconnected, and his index and middle fingers pointing up. He disconnected his hands and brought the right hand up to his mouth, with his index finger and thumb making a circle, while he began to take in a deep breath. He let out the air in one quick burst, and as it passed through the circle of his fingers, the oxygen ignited, sending a giant fireball five times the size of Itachi right at Sans.

Sans eye-sockets widened at the technique, he couldn’t believe he was seeing a human with this much control of their mana. Even Frisk, who was mana sensitive, couldn’t use it for anything. _‘I wonder how the world has changed since we started living here...’_ Sans let loose a chuckle as the fireball came closer. _‘One thing’s for sure… It’s a hell of a lot more entertaining.’_ Sans brought his hands up and pushed them in opposite directions, and subsequently something happened that shocked the ANBU to no extent. The fireball split in half, literally split in half vertically with both sides going around Sans and dissipating behind him. Sans then moved his right hand in a come hither motion, tempting the ANBU to try again.

Not wanting to waste valuable time, Itachi quickly charged at Sans, preparing to attack at him with a diagonal overhead slash, which was easily avoided by Sans. However, Sans had no time to counter attack as he was quickly flanked by Neko, who went for a sweeping slash near his hips. And so he was sandwiched by the two ANBU in a deadly dance of sword, as he fluently and narrowly dodged the sword strikes.

Finally seeing an opening, the ANBU swung at Sans again, however this time they both swung at different altitudes and from opposite directions. Sans couldn’t jump or crouch as both actions would guarantee the ANBU a hit.

Sans stomped his foot, causing two bones, which looked like elongated humerus’s, to erupt from the cavern floor, blocking the swords. He then shot both hands in the directions of the two ANBU, with his hand emulating the grasping of something.

Suddenly the ANBU began to levitate, and as Sans raised his hands so did they. His hands began to close, slowly as if he was feeling a resistance of some sort.

The ANBU quickly began to panic, dropping their swords and shooting their hands up to their necks. Their eyes bulged and their necks were tightening, they began to feel intense pain in their necks as if invisible hands were strangling them. Their vision began to slowly get spotty and blacken as the asphyxiation set in, their arms slowly lowering, their body’s slowly accepting their fate.

Their savior came swiftly, in the form of Tenzo sending a jutsu created boulder at a distracted Sans, rocketing him into a cave wall, and subsequently releasing Itachi and Neko from their invisible attacker. As they dropped to the ground they both struggled to their knees, attempting to suck in air and breathe the CO2 out at a rapid pace. Tenzo quickly appeared next to them and put his hands on their backs in worry, “Are you two okay?” he asked them in a worried and caring tone.

Neko, who was the medic of the group, was the first to get a hold of herself and replied to Tenzo in a shaken voice, “Y-yes… We w-weren’t experiencing… as-asphyxiation for too l...long.”

Itachi, who was back to normal breathing now, nodded in confirmation, “She is correct, while it may have been quite the close call, we will not suffer too much from it in the long run...” he quickly looked over at the wall that Sans had crashed into, “but, that skeleton… that was no ordinary technique, it wasn’t like the wind was pushing against our throats… No, what we were experiencing was both our necks and the air around us attempting to be condensed into a single point, like he put a black hole in our necks.” He brought up his hand to his neck, remembering the phantom pain.

“I’m surprised, you nearly got it in the first guess.” Sans said from behind the group causing Tenzo to quickly whip around while Itachi and Neko fumbled around trying to grab their tantos. As they looked at him they realized something… Sans didn’t have a scratch on him, even after being thrown into a wall. “It was far from a black hole though, but I will give you this, it does follow the same principle… Gravity.”

The ANBU’s eyes widened, an enemy that could manipulate gravity was something unprecedented, something no one had ever heard of, let alone seen first hand. And yet, here was a skeleton that could break a fundamental rule of nature, and bend it around his finger.

“Besides, it’s getting rather boring holding back like this… so, I guess I should get to the good part, eh?” Sans stated before disappearing, only to appear in front of Tenzo, with a giant humerus bone in his hands being swung like a baseball bat. As the bone came into contact with the ANBU, Tenzo disappeared in a cloud of smoke leaving behind a giant rock in his place.

Sans’ eye-sockets widened as he felt something rap around him, he looked over his shoulder and saw the cat mask of Tenzo. Tenzo body began to harden and turn into wood, he quickly looked towards his fellow ANBU and shouted, “ITACHI! NEKO! I’m can’t hold him for long. Quickly, blast him with all you’ve got!”

Both of the aforementioned ANBU nodded their heads and began to weave through separate hand signs at a break-neck pace, before stopping and holding their hands to their mouths. Both began to suck in air, with Itachi releasing his breath first, shooting out another fireball. Neko then exhaled a giant blast of wind, fanning the flame that Itachi made causing it to go from a ball to a raging inferno, an inferno headed right towards the bound Sans. The torrent of raging flames quickly engulfed Sans and the wooden Tenzo clone.

Soon afterward, the real Tenzo dropped down next to his comrades, nodding at their handiwork. “So, it seems that the Wood Release has the ability to stun non-jinchuriki for a small window of time. We should keep this in mind for a la-” Tenzo was quickly cut of when an enlarged humerus burst from his chest staining his light gray jacket in a bloody red, covering the ground in a horrible mesh of blood and viscera. Leaving no time to witness the gore ridden display, the ground itself opened up beneath him; just as quick as he fell in, the hole in the earth collapsed in on itself in a jagged and crude fashion.  
The other two ANBU were too shocked to speak, their team mate and friend had died, bloodily, in front of them in a matter of seconds. They were brought out of their horror filled stasis by a voice they believed dead, “You know, you really should check before assuming someone is dead.” The voice came from the direction of the smoke cloud that persisted after the collaboration attack by the ANBU. Sans began to walk out of the cloud as it parted before his figure, embers being riled with each step. His clothes were now covered it soot, blackening every article of clothing, however nothing suffered as much damage as his once bright red scarf, which was now incredibly short, covered in ash and had a few stray embers at the end of the tails. “Look at what you did, you ruined my brother’s scarf…”

This drew an angered reaction from the remaining ANBU, he had just killed Tenzo and he wanted to berate them for harming his scarf. Itachi’s teeth began to grind as his sharingan began to spin angrily. He quickly reached into the pouch he had taped to his right leg; pulling out three shuriken, one in between each finger, he let loose the shuriken before blurring through hand signs. As the last hand sign was reached the shuriken began to multiply, three quickly became fifteen.

Sans just stood there, hands never leaving his pockets, even though there was a huge barrage of weapons moving towards him at a fast rate. As the shuriken neared Sans, they suddenly stopped moving forward, hanging in the air before Sans. The shuriken began to spin faster, blurring into a speed that began to resonate a high pitch screeching noise. Once the shuriken were spinning at an adequate pace for Sans’ liking, he willed them to be shot forward, back in the direction of the ANBU.

Itachi was able to see the shuriken coming at him, thanks to the sharingan, and was able to move slightly out of the shurikens’ paths avoiding total laceration, but not fully avoiding damage, he suffered a small cut to the back of his calf. Neko, even thought she was a highly trained ANBU, was still limited by normal human processing speed. Sadly for her, with the velocity that the shuriken were traveling at, normal human reflexes weren’t enough to help her dodge the deadly weapons being hurled at her. Her wounds were much more severe than Itachi’s, she suffered a gash to the upper arm, which nearly exposed bone to anyone looking at her arm. Her right thigh had a large incision, luckily not as deep as the cut on her arm. While her flak jacket absorbed most of the damage on her torso, Neko was still littered with little cuts on her stomach and chest.

Sans, seeing the damage that he just inflicted, let loose a sigh as his face took a saddened expression, which was off put by his constant smile. He then held his hands up in front of him, as if to placate them. “I’m a nice guy, ya know. I don’t want to ya to suffer more than you have to. I promise to make it quick… Cause, if you keep going, you are really not gonna like what happens…” At this point Sans’ arm came down to his sides and he slumped forward and his tone became gloomy, “I don’t want to have to do that to you…”

Itachi grit his teeth as the situation, working through the pain in his leg, as he tried to come up with a plan to handle Sans. He looked at Neko, her injuries were much worse than his, meaning he would have to take on Sans solo for a while. He could barely handle Sans with help, now he had to do it alone with a wounded leg… But he would do it for his team. “Neko! Heal up, I will handle him!”

Neko, even though she was struggling to hold her tanto, looked at Itachi in worry, “But Itachi, your injured as well… Are you sure you could do it?”  
Itachi ripped of what was left of his mask, revealing the other half of his face. He quickly reached into his back pouch. “For my team I’ll go to any lengths… Now, Neko, just worry about yourself...” As his hand came back from the pouch, one could see he was holding several pills, which Neko immediately realized were military ration pills. While the pills would give him a strength and speed boost, the backlash of taking so many could very well leave Itachi comatose after they wear off. Knowing this, Neko’s worries grew exponentially, but she could do nothing about it, she had to focus on healing herself first.  
Sans let out an aggravated sigh, even though they clearly had an insane disadvantage they were going to keep going. Sans could help but feel a bittersweet sense of nostalgia wafting over him. “So your gonna keep going? I mean, I know how ya feel, not wanting to die and all that… but, your just gonna get hurt even mo-”

He was cut off by Itachi swallowing the pills in a single gulp; not a moment later he rushed at Sans like a bullet, and unlike last time Sans didn’t have enough time to dodge the incoming attack. Itachi swiftly laid his fist unto Sans’ chin, the uppercut rocketing Sans into the air at a break-neck pace. Itachi gave no reprieve in the assault though, he appeared above Sans in the air with his arms raised and hands interlocked by the finger. Sans was quickly smashed back towards the ground where Itachi was once again waiting.

Itachi put his hands together, making a cross with the index and middle fingers of both hands. Suddenly, three perfect replicas of Itachi appeared in a puff of smoke. The leftmost Itachi clone began to go through hand signs as the middle Itachi clone crouched down. As Sans cam close to the ground, the crouched clone shot forward, intercepting Sans’ falling body with a flying round house kick launching his body across the cave, where the final clone was waiting.

The two clones proceeded to brutally assault Sans, they would take turns hitting his limped body across the cave where the other would intercept and the process would start over again, punch for punch, kick for kick in what could only be described as “Skeletal Ping-Pong.” As they continued to throw Sans around like a rag doll the first clone was still going through hand signs, until he suddenly came to a stop at the final hand sign; he reared his head back, and began to intake air to such a degree that his chest actually began to expand at an unhealthy rate. As if on cue, the other clones caught Sans and actually held unto his arms, keeping him captive in the middle of the cave with noway to escape. Suddenly, the first clone shot his head forward releasing the pent up air starting a fire in its wake; however unlike the other fireballs, this stream of fire took up a coherent shape, it began to form into three large dragons, who’s mouths were agape, hungry and ready to consume anything in their way, which Sans was. The dragons quickly engulfed both Sans and the clones and shot them into the wall, where the flames began to spread higher, encompassing the entirety of the cave in a harsh, oppressive shade of orange and red.

Meanwhile, the real Itachi was panting, those clones took a lot out of him, and those pills may have helped, but they contracted muscles, upsetting his injuries even more. With the amount of chakra he put into the fire dragon, his clone was forced to dispel. Slowly, Itachi began to make his way over to the wall were the dragon impacted. The once brown wall was now a terrible shade of gray, black, and white, with a few embers and ashes coming off of it like a dark snow. However, laying amongst the ash was a charred and still burning skeleton.

Itachi quickly fell on his behind and let loose a gigantic sigh of relief. He had done it, sadly though he was definitely going to be feeling the effects of this fight for weeks, even months. He quickly lost all forms of happiness when the image of Tenzo getting skewered passed through his head… Hokage-Sama was going to be pissed.

He was interrupted from his thoughts when he felt a hand on his shoulder, he slowly turned his head to look behind him. He was greeted with the sight of his companion and teammate, Neko, who’s cuts seemed to be a lot more superficial since he last looked at her, she was still hurt, but that was as good as you were going to get from a quick fix. Her hands, now coated in a green aura, found their way down to his injured calf as she began to heal his wound. “Itachi, you should rest. While your wounds are not life threatening, they are sure to cause problems down the way if you keep moving while your under the effects of those ration pills.” Itachi nodded, he knew the risks of those pills before he took them. Once Neko felt that the healing was adequate, she stood up and helped Itachi to his feet, as she slinged an arm around her shoulders. “Now that he’s out of the way I can look into those barriers. Hopefully there is a way out of here…”

While that statement didn’t inspire much confidence in Itachi, he knew that it was their only hope to get out of this cave. As they approached the opening that they came from, they could spot another figure, upon getting closer they immediately recognized it as their squad leader, Inu, who was furiously pounding on the invisible wall. Neko quickly set Itachi down and ran to the invisible wall, “Inu-senpai! Can you hear me!?” Neko shouted, and while Inu did calm down he gave no indication that he heard her. She began to go through a unique code of sign language, which was taught to all ANBU members in case of these situations.

(Inu are you alright?)

(Yes, Neko, but you two seem worse for wear, and I can’t see Tenzo.)

(I’ll explain later senpai, but first this -)

The reunited team’s conversation was cut short by Neko getting pulled back into the cave by an unseen force. Neko crashed into the wall at the far end of the cave, causing the very rocks around her to break with the force of the impact. Just as suddenly, she shot upwards towards the roof of the cave and impacted head first and contorting her back at an inhumane angle. Her body came falling down at a break-neck pace, crashing into the ground and mangling her body even more as blood began to pour out. But the show didn’t stop there, her body began to forcibly smash into every wall, the floor, and ceiling in a never ending display of gore, the once beautiful woman now more than a crooked and broken piece of flesh. Her body smashed once more into the ground and as soon as it did it slid over to the entrance, leaving behind a trail of viscera, so that her comrades may witness what had become of her. Her body was now askew and awkward, her arms and legs now jagged and broken; her clothes were now drenched an angry red as the rags clung to her body with chunks of meat hanging to them; her once vibrant, clean purple hair was now little more than disheveled, uneven red clumps of fuzz that desperately attempted to stay on its host.

Both men were frozen as their eye locked onto the mangled body of their teammate, who, not one minute ago, was alive and well.

Itachi was brought out of his shock when he heard a voice, the last voice he expected, “I told you, didn’t I? You would just feel more pain…” Itachi looked up at the direction he heard Sans’ voice from, only to see something that would shock him even more. Inu, who couldn’t hear anything, grew curious at seeing Itachi’s expression and looked in the same direction. Slowly, descending from a hole in the roof of the cave was a giant spider, one that could easily be three times their size. It’s coat was a deep jet black, with a gold color lining the joints that connected the legs; on the back of it’s abdomen was a classic red hourglass design, but it was surrounded in a regal gold motif that went around it and down the rest of the abdomen; its eyes were just as black as its coat; the fangs started black but changed into a purple near the end, with the pincers at the side taking a red coloring near the end. Riding on the head of the spider was an unharmed Sans.

However, as the spider made it to ground level one thing was notably off with Sans, the ever constant smile he wore was nowhere to be seen, his face was perfectly strait. He looked directly at Inu through the barrier. “So this is the Inu you spoke about.” Sans’ expression began to shift, turning into a frown as he felt something he had not felt in so long. “To think, that I would ever find another with such an affinity for Integrity.”


	3. The ROOT of the Problem

Near the entrance of the dark cave was Itachi and on the other side of the barrier at the entrance was Inu, the captain of the once Team Ro. Both had just bared witness to the horrible killing of their companion and friend Neko. Itachi was close to boiling over from rage, he had tried so hard to kill Sans, only to have his efforts be for naught yet again. Inu on the other hand was staring into the eyes of the one responsible for the killing. He peered into the black abyss of Sans eye-sockets, wondering just what was this thing, how did it get here, what was its purpose? All questions he intended to get answers for.  
Sans on the other hand, didn’t pay any of that mind, he was too focus on the sight of Inu’s soul. It was dark blue in color, however unlike most souls, it was not one stagnant color, around the edge of the heart-shaped soul was a faint glow of a rainbow. This intrigued Sans to no extent; like Sans himself, Inu had a naturally dark blue soul, indicating his main trait as integrity. However, the faint rainbow glow was off… Sans could feel it, he could feel how Inu had yet to find unity with himself; Inu had experienced much, and lost more than most, but he had yet to fully face it head on, forcing the integrity to push him as he coped with his burden.

Sans felt a little nostalgic while looking at Inu’s soul, it remind him so much of his own, or at least what it used to be. Without looking away from the beautiful, yet depressing soul, Sans gave out an order to an unseen person, “Drop the barrier.”

After a second of waiting, a faint glow settled over the entrance to the cave, and just as quick as it came, it vanished. Inu began to slowly walk forward into the cave, he stopped several feet in front of the giant spider Sans rode on. He was being careful, so as to not give Sans the impression of an attempted attack, he had seen what was done to Neko, and he didn’t want an encore. “Who or what are you?” he asked cautiously.

Slowly a smile made its way back onto Sans’ face, albeit smaller than usual. He began to make his way down, off of the spider he was riding; he now stood a few feet away from Inu. He gave a small wave as he began his introduction, “My name is Sans, Sans the skeleton, I’m what you can call the guardian of these caves.” He then gestured his hand towards the spider, “And this is Lolth, she’s the queen of the spiders that inhabit these caves. And, from what I hear, you are Inu, am I right?”

Inu gingerly nodded his head at the skeleton’s question, “Yes, I am Inu, captain of Team Ro.” He then looked at Neko’s dead body, “Or at least whats left of it...”

At this line, Sans lost his smile and slumped his shoulders, “I’m sorry that you had to witness that, I never intended for this encounter to become so violent… I merely wanted to ask you to leave peacefully.” There was not much for Sans to say on the matter, after all, good intentions or not, he did kill two of Inu’s subordinates. “Speaking of which, what is your team doing here?”

Inu put his hand to his chin, try to think of a way to word his answer without offending the skeleton. “We were on a mission in the area, and while undercover we heard rumors of a- and pardon me for the wording- demon in a cave near the village.” It was now Sans’ turn to put a hand to his chin, he was thinking of how people found out about them. They had no real contact with anyone outside the cave, and no one had seen them. “If you don’t mind, Sans-san, I have a new question.”

Sans let out a chuckle, Sans-san? That sounded hilarious. Disregarding that, he rolled his hand in a motion signifying for Inu to continue.

“I know that you are a skeleton, but what are you? You are far from any normal skeleton I’ve seen.”

Sans’ smile, once again, dropped, “That’s a good question, but one I don’t have an answer to.”

“What do you mean, ‘don’t have an answer to.’”

Sans’ tone shifted to a more melancholic one, “One day, my brother found me alone in the woods next to a machine, with no memory of what it was or how I got there. He took me in, gave me my name… I soon learned that I was in a world of monsters, so I became one too, so I could be like my brother… Then, that world crumbled away around me, I lost myself… I was no monster, I was an imposter, a figment of a dream that could never come true. Am I a human? A monster? A demon? Who knows...”

“I see...” Inu’s tone had begun to match Sans’ own, to think that someone could be so lost about themselves. “I am sorry to bring up something so personal.”

Sans merely waved Inu off, “It’s nothing… I found myself some time ago. I might not know what I am, but I know who I am. And that’s all I need.”

“Regardless, the reason I ask is because I need to know if certain… unsavory… individuals are in knowledge of your existence. So, how long have you been in this cave for?”

Sans shrugged, he had no idea how long they had been here, “I’m not quite sure, but I can give you an estimate of around… Oh, say… eight hundred? Maybe...”

Inu recoiled in shock, “Eight hundred? Years!?”

Once again Sans shrugged, “Give or take...”

Inu groaned, and slump forward, “This mission report is gonna be a bitch to write…”

Sans began to chuckle at Inu’s statement, but was cut off by a high pitch voice yelling, “SANS, a large squad is making their ways here, each one of them has impossibly high amounts of L.O.V.E.”

Sans looked at the ground next to him, and sure enough he saw his companion, Flowey. He then looked back to Inu with confusion on his face, “Did you call for back-up?”

Inu, who was looking at Flowey and wondering how a flower talked, was snapped out of his thoughts by Sans question. He crossed his arms and tilted his head in confusion as well, “I never called for back-up, and the only one who knew of our mission here was the Hokage himself.”

At hearing the word ‘Hokage’ Sans confusion grew to even higher degrees. Flowey seeing the expression on Sans face quickly clarified, “In this time a kage is recognized as the strongest or wisest in the village and is chosen to lead the people. Hokage is the kage for Konoha, or the leaf village.”

Sans hearing the explanation made an ‘oh’ noise, but looked as if he still had a few questions. Inu on the other hand looked at the flower with curiosity, “How do you know that much about the villages, haven’t you been locked up here with Sans?”

The face on Flowey’s carpel adopted a smirk as Flowey crossed its leaves as if they were arms. “I’m not lazy, unlike Sans, I’ve actually studied the world. I probably know more about your world than you do.” Flowey quickly became serious again, “Sans, the squad that is coming is nothing like Inu’s. The squad that is coming is much bigger, ten people easily. And like I said, their L.O.V.E. is off the charts.”

Sans nodded before lowering his head. Suddenly, power began to roll of Sans in massive waves, causing Inu to begin to sweat profusely. An eye appeared in the black void of Sans’ left socket, the iris glowing red as blood. Inu and Itachi’s bodies began to lock up as they minds flashed through the events that took place since they entered the cave, seeing every detail again in vivid clarity, however they soon began to see an alternate version of events, slowly the two melded in their minds.

As soon as their minds came back into focus they began to look around, wondering what happened. They immediately saw something that nearly brought them to tears, Neko’s body was normal again, no longer a mutilated chunk of flesh. They could tell she was alive from the slow expansion of her chest every now and then. Itachi, seeing his teammate come back to life, looked around for Tenzo to see if he was brought back as well.

At this point Sans’ power output was brought back down to normal levels as he was sweating from exhaustion, turning back time was harder than it looked. He looked over at Inu, “They’re back… Sorry for the… inconvenience.” Sans said in between pants.

At this statement Inu’s eyes widened behind his mask, as tears threatened to spill. “Thank you, for bringing them back.”

Sans just chuckled and waved him off, “It was nothing,” he said before turning serious, “Anyway, you stay here and take care of your team. Flowey, I’ll go intercept the squad that’s coming here, I want you to set up a barrier and protect Inu...”

With his last bit said he turned to exit the cave, but not before he was stopped by Inu, who put his hand on Sans’ shoulder. “Wait, before you go… One last question. You decimated my team, killed two. But now you gave them life and are about to go protect us… Why?”

The group stood in silence waiting for Sans’ reply. Sans slowly turned around to look at Inu, and simply pointed a finger at the ANBU captain’s chest, “You remind me a lot of myself… I can’t help but wish to see the day you become one with yourself.” Not offering any time for Inu to come to terms with what he said, Sans began to walk out of the cave, a light shining briefly to indicate the erection of a new barrier.

* * *

 

Outside with Sans

* * *

 

Sans stood on the cliff side near the entrance to the cave, waiting for the new squad to come. As they dashed closer he began to feel their presence, and just as Flowey said, ever person in this group had a very high L.O.V.E. but he also noticed something that Flowey had not told him about. These people, if he could call them that, had broken souls… They held nothing, but yet they were staying together despite being so hollow. It unnerved Sans to no extent, he had never seen something so troubling. Sans could only wonder, what happened to them to make them this way?

Sans didn’t have long to ponder these thoughts, as he was forced to move left to avoid an attempted strike by one of the newcomers. As soon as he was out of the way of the attack another unknown assailant dashed at him from the side, strangely rather than using a weapon he held a slip of paper in his hand. Rather than dodge, Sans grasped at the wrist of the second assailant and began to swing him around towards his accomplice, causing the two to go flying away together. Suddenly, the slip of paper the stranger was using caught fire and was soon followed a deafening explosion.

Quickly four more assailants dashed at Sans, like team Ro they wielded tanto, however these new attackers’ tantos had rounded ends. Two of the assailants were dashing at Sans normally, while the other two were coming in for an aerial attack; they were trying to do a pincer attack to trap Sans. They were in for a surprise as Sans shot his arms out, causing them all to freeze where they were, even in mid air.

Now that he had a moment to analyze his foes, Sans could see that these people also wore masks, like team Ro, however the masks that these people wore were abstract, less defined than the animal masks that team Ro wore. Another difference between them and team Ro was that these new individuals wore long black cloaks over their attire.

As Sans was looking over the four around him, he noticed that the other four were still hiding, most likely waiting for a possible surprise attack. Seeing as they weren’t going to show themselves, Sans would take this time to get whatever information he could.

“So, what are you all doing in my neck of the woods?” His tone was lax and casual, as if he wasn’t holding them captive. He waited a little bit, taking note that none of them made a move to talk. “You don’t have to be shy around me, I’m a pretty cool guy when you get to know me.” Once again he was met with silence, so he began to move them in front of himself, holding them in the air with their arms spread, as if on an invisible crucifix. Letting loose a sigh, Sans began to walk towards the group; as soon as he was within arms distance of them he held a hand towards the chest of one assailant. “Since you don’t want to talk, I’ll just do things the ol’ fashioned way…”

Sans slowly pushed his hand forward, touching the man’s clothed chest, causing an odd rippling that looked as if he had just touched water. He began to retract his hand, and with it came a small heart. The heart was gray in color, however it looked to be broken with cracks running along it in various areas, only being held together by chains that bore strange black markings.

* * *

 

Back with Flowey and the ANBU

* * *

 

Inu was currently with Itachi and the now conscious Neko and Tenzo, watching Sans through the barrier. Sans had the assailants floating in front of him, as he reached forward they all saw something come out of the man’s body. It was an odd heart-shaped thing that was covered in chains. Inu was the first to vocalize his confusion about the item, “What is that?”

He looked towards Flowey who was also at the entrance of the cave, “That is the manifestation of that human’s soul.”

The ANBU team looked at the soul then back to Flowey, this time it was Itachi who asked the question, “Are all souls like that?”

Flowey finally looked towards the ANBUs, “In general, the shape is the same, however, depending on your characteristics, your souls color will change. For instance, you Neko have a green soul, which means you are exceptionally kind, you put others first. Tenzo both you and Itachi have yellow souls, meaning you feel a strong sense of justice.”

They nodded at this, finding the information to be mostly accurate, “Then what is does his soul mean?” Tenzo asked pointing at the strange soul that Sans pulled from the assailant.

Flowey’s face scrunched up, looking a little frustrated, “His soul is something I’ve never seen before, it is empty, souls that are empty should never be able to function, but his is. What has me worried are the chains around it, souls never have chains or anything else on them.”

The group’s conversation dwindled into silence, everyone racking their brains thinking about the strange soul that the man held.

* * *

Back with Sans

* * *

Sans gingerly held his hand in front of him with the heart floating above his hand; suddenly, his hand shot up, engulfing the heart in his grip as he began to squeeze it. The fragile heart did not last long and gave way under Sans’ vice grip, crushing it into dust. The soul donor’s body fell from it’s suspended position, no longer having a soul to keep it sustained, as Sans’ mind was assaulted by images and flashbacks of the man’s life.

* * *

The images started back at the man’s childhood, which was very normal despite the fact that he was an orphan. He was five now, and his caretaker had just informed him that his new guardians were on their way to adopt him, as they have already filled out the paperwork. He was so excited, he would finally have a family, a father and mother of his own.

The time came as someone knocked on the orphanage door, two people came inside, they seemed to be nothing special, but to him that didn’t matter.  
“Tou-san...” he said meekly as he looked at the male who arrived, who nodded with a smile on his face. He then looked to the female, “Kaa-chan...” who also nodded happily at the boy, as she dropped to her knees with her arms extended. The boy quickly ran to her, getting engulfed in a hug with tears streaming down his face.

* * *

“Are we almost at there, kaa-chan?” The young boy asked the woman as he followed her, holding hands.

The woman gave an amused laugh, “We’re almost their, it’s on the next block.”

As they came up to the house, the man began to rummage through his pocket, most likely searching for his keys. As he went inside he was surprised to find that the house was devoid of furniture, seeing this he turned to ask his new parent why that was, only to be knocked out before he could ask.

* * *

It had been several years since his induction into the secret world of Konoha’s underground military, known as Root. He had since learned that the ones who adopted him were actually members themselves who were used to obtain orphans in illegal smuggling, not that he cared. He had been reeducated by those who ran Root, brainwashing him to never feel emotion, so he literally couldn’t care any less.

He, along with nine other members of Root, were gathered for a mission by the man who was the leader of Root. They were all currently waiting for said man to appear and tell them of their mission. They did not have to wait long, as an aged man walked into the room. The older man wore a white, long sleeve shirt; over it he wore a dark gray robe that goes down to his feet, and covers his right arm and shoulder; at the waist of his robe he has a thin green sash to hold the robe. He has bandages covering his right eye and forehead, with shaggy, dark brown hair; on his chin is a scar in the shape of a cross. This man was Danzo Shimura, elder of Konoha, and leader of Root.

“You all know why I have called you here, so I will move directly into the details of the mission.” Danzo’s voice was calm and cold, betraying no emotion, “An associate of mine has found out of the existence of some sort of creature that holds unbelievable power, it has been going throughout the world, but no one has come forth about it or even seen it.” He began to point to various villages on the map behind him with his cane, “My associate has various bases throughout the world and has taken note of them whenever possible, Kumo, Iwa, even here in Konoha, and yet none of us knew about it. Recently he has found a large signature of it underground in Heiya no Kuni. Your mission is to attempt to capture this creature, if you can not capture it you are to kill it and bring in its corpse for study. Your mission is of utmost importance, if you take too long other villages may catch wind of this as well. We can not afford to lose such a potential weapon for Konoha.”

* * *

Sans’ eyes narrowed as he looked through the man’s memories. That man, Danzo, was obviously talking about Flowey, after all, Flowey was the only one who ever left the cave. He wanted Flowey for a weapon, he wanted to kill or enslave both him and his last friend in the world, all for power. If Sans had blood it would be boiling at this point, Sans very protective of his friends, overly protective some might say. The thought of his friend being a slave brought him anger, but the thought of Flowey dead, as they poked and prodded its body nearly brought him to the breaking point.

Sans was brought out from his thoughts by the arrival of the last four Root members, who circled around him, placing four slips of paper on the ground around him. His mana suddenly started depleting, his hold of the Root members failing. He now had seven Root members encircling him. Despite how bad the situation seemed Sans just lowered his head, his smile getting bigger; slowly, he began to laugh, it started off small, barely a chuckle, but soon it turned into maniacal laughter. His teeth began to sharpen, with the tooth that would be his left canine turning gold; his jacket slowly darkened becoming a black color with the fur on it becoming spiky and gray; the tee-shirt he wore under his jacket turned red; his short stayed relatively the same, minus the new yellow streaks on the front of each leg; instead of his slippers he now had yellow and white, steel toed shoes.

His laughter soon died down as he began to address the Root operatives, “You know, sealing my mana won’t make it any easier.” His tone now held none of its usual laziness, now it held madness, but also held an odd authoritative commanding undertone, keeping the madness in check. “If all you think this will weaken me, then you are mistaken. All this will do is make it all the more fun to kill you. To watch as you struggle, and beg against an opponent that you have no hope of defeating. After all… I’m gonna have a **GREAT** time!”

* * *

Back with Flowey and the ANBU

* * *

The group was in awe at the transformation that Sans was undergoing. He looked so different from the Sans they had all seen a moment ago, the Sans they met was lazy and never took anything seriously, but this Sans, he looked primed to kill. His eyes held an insane gleam, and his smile was now sharp, he looked like a predator about to strike.

Inu looked over at Flowey seeing a dark smile begin to form on the flower’s face as well, “What is happening to him?”

Flowey didn’t move as it watched Sans, not even reacting to Inu’s question. After a few moments of silence, Flowey began to answer Inu, without looking away from Sans. “This is what happens when you get Sans angry, he lets this form take over.” Flowey’s voice was now slightly raspy, as it looked at Sans with longing.

Inu began to get confused, “What do you mean ‘this form’?”

Flowey sighed at Inu’s question, “A long time ago, there was an underground world full of monsters. One day a human fell into our world, and was found by a monster, who took pity on her, seeing as how she was a child. The monster showered the girl with love, taking on a parental role for the girl, teaching her about the underground. One day however, that all changed… the girl slaughtered the monster that raised her, and proceeded to kill any monster she came across, one of which was Sans’ brother. After that day Sans joined the underground’s royal scientists as a bodyguard and helper, he even let them turn his body into a weapon to kill the girl. However, this was not enough, he too had fallen at the hands of the human, he too had died.” Flowey paused, allowing Inu to digest what he was just told, “The thing that happened next is a mystery to even me, somehow he had held his broken soul together. However, this was not without it’s price… with the reanimation of Sans’ soul, Sans had essentially broken trough a barrier that was never meant to be broken. He had started to become one with himself, a singularity of his soul. You have heard of the multiverse theory, correct?” Seeing Inu nod his head, Flowey continued, “Sans had basically melded with every version of himself. The Sans you see out there, with those people, is one of them. His most blood thirsty version, he comes from a universe where Sans descended into chaos and madness.”

Inu simply stood there looking at Sans, until he remembered something from earlier and asked Flowey about it, “You said his soul was ‘broken’, correct? But you also said broken and empty souls don’t typically hold together. So I must ask, what separates Sans from that norm?”

“Good question, a very good question indeed. But, like with that humans hollow soul, I have no answer. However, with the little information Sans have given to me, I can speculate.” Flowey then closed its eyes and used the leaves on its stem to take up a thinking pose, “As said by Sans earlier, we have no idea of his origins, but he has revealed to me that in the machine that he was next to when he came into the underground had a photo book of four humans. The badge he wears, the lightning one, was also in the machine, but the odd thing is that a young boy in the photo book took a picture with it on. This information leads me to believe that Sans was once human, but somehow became a monster, most likely via that odd machine he was found next to. While this itself is not very relevant to the question, it will come into play later in the explanation. You remember how I said that Sans was a helper for the royal scientists and how he volunteered to become a weapon. The experiment that was carried out on Sans was the injection of a controlled dose of the soul trait determination, which is highly volatile and unstable in a monster’s soul; unlike previous subjects, Sans’ soul latched onto the new trait, and allowed for the use of a powerful weapon called the ‘Gaster Blaster’, named after the royal scientist who proceeded Sans’ era. When the time came for Sans’ death, his body started to fall apart and dissolve, much like the previous specimens for the ‘Operation Determination’. However, what happens next is where the oddity and speculation begins; though his body was dissolving his soul had continued to function holding his body together, but at the same time his soul was slowly dissolving as well due to the injection of a new piece of soul, but it was that same determined fragment that held the soul together, causing an odd limbo that resulted in him being both dead and alive. From here I feel as though the splitting of his soul disconnected each fragment from each other, and the traumatic incident caused each fragment to develop its own personality, making Sans have M.P.D. but again this is all speculation.” Flowey finally stopped to take a breather after that lengthy explanation of Sans.

Inu nodded to himself, going through the information in his head, before looking towards Flowey with another question, “Sans said that I reminded him of himself, what did he mean?”

Flowey merely gave a chuckle at the question, “Now that question is much simpler, you both have primarily dark blue souls, souls of integrity. Though, much like Sans, your soul has a rainbow aura around it, indicating the holding of every soul trait: Determination, Patience, Bravery, Integrity, Perseverance, Kindness, and Justice. However, your soul has yet to fully embrace itself, most likely due to a traumatic experience that made you question yourself, much like Sans before he became what he is today.” Behind his mask, Inu’s eyes widened at what Flowey said, it was pretty spot on with the truth behind his past. He looked back to Sans, who was participating in a blood bath. Despite how unassuming he looked, he had a fuck ton of depth.

* * *

Back with Sans

* * *

 

Sans was currently surrounded by the seven Root members, they stood silently waiting for Sans to move. Sans’ smile only grew as time moved forward, well if they wanted him to go first, he might as well indulge them. He quickly launched himself at one of the Root members; even though he just had all his mana stolen, he could still run at incredible speeds, but not fast enough to catch the Root off guard. As he tried to punch the head of Root member number one, said Root operative sidestepped out of the way; as he dodged the other operatives dashed at Sans. As they all came close, Sans back flipped, landing just behind one operative; he shot his hand through the ninja’s back, causing his hand to come out of the man’s stomach. “You’ve all got some **guts**! But I think you may need a **hand** for that injury!” He began to laugh maniacally as he put his other hand on the man’s arm, using it for leverage as he ripped the man in half with his impressive strength, causing a large amount of blood and intestines to start staining the floor and Sans.

The others began to attack Sans, as he used the torso of the deceased Root operative as a shield to block hits. When he saw an opening, Sans caught a kick sent at him, “Let’s go for a spin!” He then dropped the Root torso he was holding to grab the new Root’s leg with both hands, he began to turn rapidly, using the operative as a weapon against his companions. He then let go of the operative with one hand so he could grab his arms as well, “This fight is gonna cost you an **arm** and a **leg**!” He put his foot on the mans stomach as he began to painfully rip the man’s limbs off. Sans looked down at the squirming Root operative beneath him, he slowly crouched down and put a hand on his stomach. He began to pull the mans soul out, but rather than crush it, Sans brought it up to his mouth, and for the first time, Sans’ mouth opened as he started to eat the soul.

Sans turned back to the rest of the Root members, who were in defensive positions. Suddenly, a red aura began to surround Sans as his mana was being refilled, thanks to that Root operative’s soul. Sans shot a hand forward, causing the remaining five Root to be launched into the cliff wall.

Sans chuckled at them, “I told you that getting rid of my mana was useless. And now, the real fun gets to start. Who wants to go first?” His question was met with silence, like usual. Sans quickly began to lose his temper at their desire to remain quiet, “Fine, you want to play like that, then I’ll pick for you. Eeny, Meeny, Miny, Moe; catch the human by the toe; if he screams, then down he’ll go; Eeny, Meeny, Miny, Moe.” He stopped as he looked toward the leftmost Root operative. He moved the Root ninja in front of him so that he could get a front row seat when the magic happened.

Sans began to focus his gravity powers inside of the mans body, more specifically his lungs, he started to use gravity to make the air in his lungs vibrate at an incredible rate. The air in his lungs began to heat, causing minor discomfort, but soon the heat began to rise. As the heat of the air in his lungs raised, the cavity in his chest began to expand, as well as melt from the inside out. Soon the man began to scream in pain as steam began to expand unhealthily inside his body, going into his vains causing literally his whole body to inflate, soon the heat became to much as his skin started to let loose steam from his pores. His screams soon deafened as he died, but his body continued to expand. Soon a hole was made in his skin was made from the melting, causing all the hot air in his body to attempt to escape at once, which led to his body exploding in a grotesque display of human confetti.

Sans turned back to his captives, “Well that was a **blast** , but who wants to go next?”

For the first time since they arrived, the Root showed emotion, Fear, as they began to furiously point at anyone that wasn’t themselves. Sans immediately zoned in on one unlucky fucker who had two people pointing at him, he began to bring him closer, “Look who’s our next contestant on ‘The Price is Right’.”

Just like with the last operative, Sans began to focus his power on the man, however this time he focused it on the man’s heart and veins. Sans used his power to make the blood flowing through the man’s body to start moving at an accelerated rate. The man’s vision focused and his thought processing increased, his new blood flow allowed for his brain to constantly get oxygen, allowing for him to constantly feel alert, however the problem came when it continued to get faster. His heart began to pump blood faster, and faster, slowly an ache began to form. That ache only got worse as the flow got faster, soon his heart couldn’t keep up, causing the blood to flow irregularly; soon, the man’s heart began to fail, as his veins began to clot, he was slowly having a forced heart attack.

Sans looked a little sad, while this was a fun way to kill someone, as it was very painful and slow, it didn’t drop any blood and he didn’t like that. He threw the man away, he could deal with the failing heart by himself. He began to look at the remaining three. Rather than saying anything witty he just pulled one from the group, he didn’t feel like taking his time, he just wanted some blood after not getting any from the last victim. He began to put gravity on the man from four different directions, each pulling on an arm or leg. Slowly his limbs became unhinged, popping out of place; Sans not wanting to take it slow quickly upped the gravity of each limb causing them to go flying in four different directions. Seeing as the man was still alive, Sans made two more field of gravity, one focused on his neck while the other pulled his face and body down, causing him to be asphyxiated on what looked to be an invisible noose.

He looked at the last two alive, he needed to make this quick, he could feel the real Sans getting impatient, he had to make this last kill quick so that Sans could bring that last member back to the ANBU. Looking at the two his smile fell, “As much as I would love to do this all day, I’ve got a schedule to keep… So I’ll make this quick.”

Putting his hands in his pockets, Sans silently willed the root ninja to shoot off into the air, at about ten meters up Sans got rid of all influence on the man’s gravity causing him to begin to plummet, Sans’ eye began to glow an eerie red as a figure began to form behind him, a skull, however the skull seemed somewhat alien; it had the basic shape of a dog’s skull however it had much steeper slope on the nose ridge, and less teeth in the mouth and its jaw was detached in the middle, however the oddest feature of the skull was the three spikes emerging from the back of it, one behind each temple and another on the back of the skull that fell in line with the curvature of the forehead; in its left eye socket was a red iris that glowed the same eerie color as the one in Sans’ right eye socket.

The giant skull began to point its snout upward, towards the root nin, in the gap of the goliath’s jaws a white glow began to form, and slowly it grew brighter but never got bigger; the jaws began to unhinge, causing them to spread wide, as this happened the ball of light got steadily bigger. Suddenly the ball erupted, causing a giant beam of energy to barrel outwards, directly at the falling root. The laser quickly enveloped the root nin, but did not stop there as it continued upward, eventually parting the clouds with the power of it. Slowly the laser began to dwindle and stop, leaving behind a big circular hole in the cloud it passed through, and just as quickly as the skull appeared, it disappeared as well. Leaving behind Sans who was making his way over to the last root operative; Sans closed his eyes, as slowly his clothes began to change back to their original forms.

As he opened his eyes, Sans cringed at the sight before him. He thought that Fell would have at least a little restraint, but knowing Fell it was mostly a mute point in the end. Either way it hardly mattered now, all he had to do was bring this last nin to Inu and inform him of what he found.

* * *

Back with Flowey and the ANBU

* * *

 

The ANBU had been standing, or sitting, next to the entrance of the cave, watching the transformed Sans slaughter those unknown assailants with ease, showing much more brutality than anything he tried on them. He wasn’t lying when he said he was going easy on them, not to mention the sheer power in that last attack. As the ANBU were looking at the sky in shock, Flowey was looking at Sans, the face on its carpel now had a jagged and crooked mouth, and its eyes were black and hollow; Flowey was looking at Sans in a way akin to lust, though Flowey was a flower and therefore asexual, it still could not help but become excited at the massacre that just took place.

Flowey quickly dropped the barrier as Sans came closer, toting a gravity-bound ninja. When they noticed Sans, the ANBU, minus Inu, all looked rather guarded, weather or not he helped them, he killed two of them first. Inu seemed to be the only ANBU who reacted positively to Sans’ return, “So, you brought one of them. Although I would like to thank you, I must ask that you to give me a few minutes alone with him to ask him some questions.”  
Sans nodded, “He’s all yours, but before you do, I must tell you something. He’s from your village, a-”

He was suddenly cut off by Tenzo who seem to already know the answer, “-Root operative, I know, I used to be one after all; unlike normal ANBU, who wear porcelain masks, Root wears clay masks that are more organic in nature.”

“Thank you for elaborating, but anyways, these Roots were all orphans who were kidnapped and forced into service, to ensure loyalty and control the leader did something to their tongues to make sure no secrets got out. I’m not quite sure what it is, as I have no knowledge of ninja techniques and terminology, but I’m bringing this to you so that you may find a way around this if possible.”

Hearing Sans’ description of the technique used on the Root, Inu decided to have Neko, the teams seal expert, check it out. Quickly nodding to Sans, he beckoned Neko to come closer as he began to put cuffs on the man’s hands.

Seeing as he was no longer needed, Sans slowly put the Root on the ground and looked away towards where he thought Flowey was, only to see Flowey had disappeared. Suddenly, Sans felt something on his leg, looking down he saw a vine was wrapped around his leg and up his shorts; slowly, the vine made its way up his body curving around his bones, soon the vines made it to his ribs. Sans could feel the vines go through various ribs and around his spine, which felt rather weird; he could now feel it crawling to his neck as a large flower head came out of his shirt’s neck hole. Flowey had wrapped up his body and was rubbing its petals into his cheek, still with the same face and look from before. Flowey began to talk to Sans in a hushed voice, which was only made quieter by the raspyness, “Sans… you know of how your savagery tempts me; of how the blood stirs a base urge that I can never scratch; of how the death brings a hot passion to my cold soul. You know that each time that you go all out that you do this to me, you know that I can not never satisfy it, but you continue to torment me… How it hurts… How I love it...”

At this point Sans looked to be slightly annoyed at Flowey’s statement, “Flowey, I understand that you have a few screws loose, but how many times are we gonna go through this?”

Flowey pulled away from Sans face and looked at him with a pained expression, “Even now you deny me… this is only adding on to the mountain of lust that will one day become a rock slide.”

Sans put his hand to his face and pinched the bridge of his nose, “Flowey, it’s when you say shit like that, that makes me want to never accept your advances… Well that and sex between a skeleton and a flower would make literally no sense, as neither of us have genitalia.”

“Oh, but there are ways to fix that, my numbskull friend.”

Sans just paused, his body stiff, his head slowly swiveled to look at Flowey, “No comment...”

Their little back and forth gag was quickly cut short by Inu who had finished with his impromptu interrogation, “As weird and funny as your conversation is, we should really move past that and discuss more important things.” Sans quickly agreed while Flowey shot Inu a glare, “From what we gathered, Danzo only got this information so quickly, because an ally of his was the one discovered it. The information is already public, so it will more than likely get into the hands of the less-than-friendly nations. I would suggest you find somewhere to hide, but I’m not sure if that will work considering they can spot Flowey by using subsurface chakra detectors, which are very cheap since they have no apparent commercial use.”

Despite the odd conversation beforehand, Sans and Flowey were now at full seriousness, this was a very important topic, after all. Sans was the first to voice his complaints, “So, basically we have to either be on the move constantly or be ready to fight constantly, what a pain...”

It was now Flowey’s turn to add its rebuttal to Sans comment, “Not necessarily Sans, there are various laws that would make it virtually impossible to hunt us. Such as the pact between all nations to never steal an object of power, unless deemed to be an M.A.D. weapon, or if the village that owns said object of power has become corrupt by the word of its nation’s lord.”

Inu nodded at Flowey’s knowledge of the Elemental Nations laws, “That is true Flowey, but only applies to weapons owned by a village: such as a ninja, tool, or demon.”  
Flowey just smiled as it tightened around Sans’ neck, “That is the point, Inu.”

Inu made an ‘ah’ sound in revelation of what Flowey had planed, “You plan to have both you and Sans join a hidden village. And considering all things, most likely Konoha.”

Flowey nodded at Inu, “Correct, it will put not only protect us from public attack from other nations, but it will also protect from hidden attacks by Root. After all, what better place to hide from the shadows than in the light, where everyone can see you.”

“Plus you have us in your pocket, as either we comply and you go to Konoha, or we deny you, die, and you still go to Konoha, because no village would deny the chance to get a potentially high powered ally… Clever, you’ve backed us into a corner. You are quite cunning Flowey.”

“Thank you, thank you. But, honestly when you have hundreds of souls, who’s Iqs average around ninety per, you tend to be pretty smart.”

Sans finally decided to chip in and ask Flowey a question, “Are you sure, what about the spiders? We’re their guardians, after all.”  
Rather than Flowey answering, Inu decided to give his advice to Sans first, “If you’re worried about them, then once you learn to utilize summons, you can forge a pseudo-contract with them. I have done the same with a pack of dogs. That way you can keep them in a safe environment but get their help at any time.”

Sans began to take a second to think over the details to see if going to Konoha was worth it, as he went through his thoughts Itachi looked at Inu with worry in his eyes, “Are you sure you want to bring them to Konoha, Taicho? Look at what he did to two of our best ANBU, imagine what trouble he could bring.”

Inu simply looked at Itachi before replying in a straight voice, “They are strong enough to kill us all, they do not need us to get to Konoha. Doing this ensures a good relationship with Konoha for now. This is the only logical thing to do.”

Itachi hesitantly nodded at his captain, “Hai, taicho…”

“Sorry to but in.” They turned to see Sans who now lost his contemplative look and became serious once again, “I have reached a decision, I shall company you back to Kono… Kana… Naho…”

Everyone face planted at Sans’ attempts to be serious before he butchered ‘Konoha’. Flowey who looked the most amused simply corrected him, “It’s Konoha, Sans. Koh-NO-Hah. Remind me to teach you Japanese on the way there.”

Sans simply continued to smile as he scratched his head, “Sorry. But anyway, that aside, Flowey I need you to place barriers in the spiders’ nests and tunnels, so that when I collapse the cave I don’t kill them or destroy their home.”

“Before you do, I would suggest you let Neko make some seals for the pseudo-contract. After that you’ll have to place them in the nest. I would appreciate a little speed, after all, it’ll take long enough to get there with a prisoner and two guests, we don’t want to waste more time.” Inu finished with a sigh, thinking about all the events that transpired. This mission got a helluva lot more complicated, real fast. The report was gonna be huge…

Wait…

Inu just realized, _‘I haven’t started on the report for the original mission, let alone this one… man, fuck my life…'_


	4. The Invisible Tree City... Oh

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well... Shit... It's been a long time since I actually updated this shit...  
> So... I guess, here it is.  
> Chapter Four of A New Adventure Sans the Determination.  
> Not much else to talk about... So, I hope you enjoy.  
> Also should you have questions, feel free to hit me up.  
> ...  
> I'll get out of your way now.  
> ...  
> I'm Shadow, by the by. Almost forgot to introduce myself there. ( *-*' )

It has been little over three days since the confrontation with Sans and the ANBUs, with Sans and Flowey in tow, were almost back to Konoha. The trip had been peaceful for the most part, minus the times Flowey had attempted to kill Sans while teaching him Japanese and history. There was only so many fuck ups and puns that Flowey could handle. Today they were walking so that they could take a break after all the insanity that happened in the cave, and it also allowed for the hokage to have ample amount of time to think of how to deal with the situation that he would have on his plate.

Noticing that they were nearing the edge of the forest, Inu motioned for them to halt, "Alright, Sans, in a little while we will be reaching Konoha. To avoid questions and other problems, I will be giving you a cloak that you will be wearing until we talk with Hokage-Sama. I want you to follow my lead and keep your head down with your hood up, I don't want anyone noticing you before we formulate a plan of action." Seeing Sans nod, Inu reached into his pouch to pull out a scroll, in which the cloak was stored. As he brought out the cloak, Inu looked at Flowey, "You will also need to be hidden, and considering the fact that there is no dirt in the Hokage Tower, you will have to hide in Sans' clothes while we are in Konoha."

Flowey said nothing, opting to give Sans a creepy smile as it slowly slithered closer. As Flowey crawled up his leg Sans couldn't help but let loose an exasperated sigh, this was gonna be a long day. Soon Flowey was set up, holding on to Sans' ribs for support; Sans could practically feel the vines rubbing up and down on his bones. In obvious discomfort, Sans held his hand out, "Just give me the cloak, I want to get this out of the way as fast as possible."

Inu chuckled at Sans' attitude, and handed him the newly unsealed white cloak, which Sans threw on without hesitation.

Inu nodded to the rest of team Ro as he pushed past the small amount of foliage. Sans followed behind, and as soon as he got past the tree line, he was frozen.

From the hill they were on he could only see a small portion of Konoha, but he could see the people leaping from buildings, young groups of boys and girls leaving for the first time, and the occasional small child trying to get a peek of the outside of Konoha.

A city…

It truly just dawned on him now…

To see the world so… whole brought a lightness to Sans' soul that he hadn't felt in years. He could finally see the smiling faces of children again, he could see students learning, the elderly recalling memories of a time that seems so far away.

The world might be different, but the world hadn't changed a bit.

Sans was quickly brought out of his musing by Inu, who, after noticing Sans' vacant look, came to remind him of their appointment, "You can wait till afterwards to sight see, we need to see Hokage-Sama."

Sans quickly nodded, he took one final look before pulling his furred blue hood up.

* * *

Meanwhile, the third Hokage, Hiruzen Sarutobi was standing near the window of his office. He was a very old man, easily in his seventies; his hair was balding at the top and his face held a few splotches from old age. He was wearing his hokage robes, but chose to leave the hat on his desk. He had been in this office all night, thinking about the information that Team Ro had sent him; normally he would receive mission reports on return, but he was glad Inu thought ahead and sent it by summon.

He stood at the window smoking his pipe as he looked over his people, the people of Konoha. Whether they realized it or not, this entire situation would impact them all if he didn't handle this properly. At first one might think 'Getting a god like monster to join your village for free, what's not to love?', but Hiruzen was not green enough to presume that a creature of this "Sans'" caliber would come without consequences. If the other villages caught wind of this, it could upset the scales of power and cause another Great Shinobi War, and god-like entity or not, Konoha couldn't handle another war. But, that paled in comparison to some of the threats that came from within Konoha itself, namely Danzo; if Danzo could get his hands on a fraction of the power this "Sans" holds, it could launch Konoha into a civil war, which could lead to even more catastrophe.

The more he thought about the situation, the more stressed he became, "Why did I ever get into politics? If I didn't already have gray hair, I could swear that I was losing color every day from stress." He took a long drag, as an ANBU appeared behind him.

"Team Ro is here, sir." He stated calmly, bowing low to Hiruzen.

Slowly he let out the smoke, then began to address the ANBU, "Tell them to enter. Seal the door while you're at it." As the ANBU left he walked back to his desk and picked up the scroll containing Inu's report. Turning back to the doorway, he could see Team Ro enter and kneel, but Hiruzen's attention was focused on the person standing next to them. "Inu, stand. This is the one you call 'Sans', correct?"

Inu did as he was told, before nodding his head and motioning towards the cloaked Sans, "Yes sir. As you have no doubt read, he and his companion are looking for asylum in Konoha."

Hiruzen nodded as he walked closer to Sans, "I am quite aware, but first, allow me to introduce myself." He then extended his hand towards Sans, "I am Sarutobi Hiruzen, Sandiame Hokage of Konohagakure no Sato."

Sans pulled down his hood, before accepting the handshake from the man, "Sans the Skeleton, the pleasure is all mine."

After pulling away from the greeting, Hiruzen walked back to his desk and sat down, "Now, with that out of the wasy, I would be more than happy to accept you into Konoha, but there are many factors that could prove to be dangerous, should you join us. The first is that, should anyone find out, there are many laws between counties regulating WMDs, which you would be considered legally. We would have to go though many, many political loops to prove that your allegiance isn't considered MAD, and the fact that we, Hi no Kuni, are not attempting to tip the scales of power. These are just a few of the problems with the legal process for this; the second point lies more on the illegal side of the spectrum, Shinobi villages often go through less-than legal means to obtain tools from other villages. This would normally not be a problem, but considering the fact that we are in a lower point of security, because of the Kyuubi attack nine years ago, the potential backlash would prove most catastrophic." He quickly stopped his train of thought, in favor of taking a drag from his pipe to relieve stress, "The point is, that we have to take means to hide your existence, or rather your identity as a monster of god-like proportions. If any of you have recommendations, do feel free to chime in."

Neko, who had remain silent for the entire meeting, stood up from her kneeling and addressed the Hokage, "It could be advantageous if we were to put seals on the inside of his clothes to hide his energy; Jiraiya-sama won't be back for another month, but I can provide a substitute until then."

Hiruzen leaned back into his chair, "That is a good idea for hiding his power, but there is still the fact that he is clearly not human, just by looking at him. We could do a genjutsu, but there are no illusionists that have the ability to make solid transformations, let alone hold them for hours on end…"

"I wouldn't say that." They were interrupted by a new voice, one that was higher pitched than most of the people in the room; as Hiruzen looked around he noticed Sans' clothes jostling, suddenly a flower with a face popped out of Sans' shirt neck, "The solution is pretty simple, Sans can release a small amount of mana and use gravity to pack the mana so tightly that it becomes solid, then I, using my infinite mana spring, can hold an illusion on him from inside him, where I will be hidden by the false skin and seals in Sans' clothes."

Hiruzen hummed to himself as he thought about Flowey's suggestion, "If you could pull it off, that would be the best route to pursue, but it would be rather suspicious if we were to just take in a random person, we need to come up with a reason he had an ANBU escort and sudden citizenship in Konoha."

Flowey just chuckled before talking again, "Simple, again. Sans has the ability to make bones appear from nowhere, so it would make the most sense to say that he is a Kaguya that came here after his family was killed in the 'Bloodline Purge' of Kiri."

Hiruzen shifted forward and began to read through a scroll next to him, "Yes… Yes, that could work indeed. Thank you for helping me with that, I have many idea's for how to resolve this, I must get to work immediately." He then looked up at his ANBU, "Inu, have one of your team members escort Sans around the village, after he is disguised of course. I need you to work on securing a blank summoning scroll and check on 'you know who'. Neko, after you are done with sealing Sans' clothes, you are to report to the ANBU hospital wing. That is all, dismissed."

The ANBU nodded as Itachi turned to Inu, "I volunteer to escort Sans, Inu-taicho."

"All right, Itachi, good luck." Inu then motioned for Tenzo to follow him, "I'll need you to help watch while I secure the scroll." He was about to leave when he quickly turned back to Hiruzen, "I almost forgot… Here is the stasis scroll holding the prisoner." He pulled out a small scroll before disappearing in a swirl of wind and leaves along side Tenzo.

It was at this time that Neko finished up the seals and waved goodbye to Itachi, before she too left Sans and Itachi.

"So, Itachi… Where to?"

Itachi looked back to see Sans standing behind him in his transformation. He looked roughly the same, minus the fact that he was human looking now and had short, messy white hair; his eyes were half lidded, almost as if he were about to fall asleep, and under his eyes he had noticeable tear troughs, much like Itachi; his huge toothy smile was now just a simple lazy grin.

Itachi took a second to take in Sans' new appearance before shrugging and opening the door for Sans as he talked, "We can go through an in depth tour later, for now I am rather hungry, so we will be going to a shop to grab some food."

Sans paused mid step at the mention of food, as he slowly turned his head to look at Itachi, "Do… Do you guys have any noodle shops…?"

* * *

Itachi was dumbfounded, when Sans asked him about noodle shops he hadn't expected it to mean anything. Mostly he thought that Sans had some kind of nostalgia for noodles, and along the way that made Itachi think if Sans could even eat; when they got to the ramen booth, Ichiraku Ramen, he had bared witness to the most shocking scene he had ever experienced. He and the operators of the shop watched in rapt attention as Sans shoveled ramen into his mouth at a break neck pace, never seeming to chew or stop for air. He just continued eating more and more, as bowls began to pool up next to his eating space.

Itachi couldn't help but ask, "How do you eat so much?"

At this question, Sans stopped eating and examined his surroundings; he could see Itachi with his mouth agape in shock, the owners, however, had more amused looks on their faces. He quickly looked sheepish and gave a nervous chuckle, "Hehe… Sorry. It's just been so long since I've had noodles, and suffice it to say, they were much better than my brother could ever make."

The old man who, who seemed to be the head chef, let loose a hearty laugh, "No problem, m'boy. As our number one customer says, 'We make the best ramen in the world, only at Ichiraku's.'"

The young waitress seemed to get embarrassed at the man's not-so-subtle boasting, "You don't need to go saying that every ten minutes, dad. It's kind of bad to go tooting your own horn that much."

The old man just responded with the same hearty laugh as before, "It is all about confidence in the market place, Ayame. But, I must say, m'boy, you sure have the appetite of an Akamichi and the love for ramen of an Uzumaki!"

Ayame quickly pinched her father's ear, berating him for making such a comment about a customer to their face. Sans merely crossed his arms and laughed at the two, seeing the irony of the two's roles. He turned in his seat to face Itachi, "So, Itachi… I must ask, why did you volunteer to be my escort?"

Itachi leaned his arms on the table, as he clasped his hands together and closed his eyes, seemingly in thought, "… I wanted to… thank you. For opening my eyes to something, I have progress much farther, much faster than any other person for the past few decades. Due to this, I have become complacent in my progress and assumed that I could simply defeat anything that crosses my path. Now I know that I must get stronger to protect those I love. The next reason is a little simpler, it was for saving my friends."

Sans lazy grin quickly disappeared at this comment, "Even though I was the one to cause them harm in the first place?"

"Whether or not you harmed them first doesn't matter, you brought them back and you protected us in our time of vulnerability. Those actions defined your character to me, and I have to thank you for the good deeds, not fester on the bad." The smile on Sans face increase tenfold, almost resembling his original smile, "But, I feel we've eat for long enough, let us get on with the tour. And, I hope you mind another detour."

Sans stood up as Itachi payed the Ichiraku's for the ramen, "Sure but, may I ask where?"

"Simple, we will be stopping by my residence, as I have been gone for a while and I would like to report my status to Father, as he is a very strict man, from there we should have little complications."

Sans' expression became rather thoughtful, as they exited the store, "I must admit, Itachi, I'm rather interested to meet your family."

Itachi quickly became a little embarrassed, "Umm… About that… This is a little weird to ask but, while I talk with Father, I would like it if you were to sit down and have a chat with my sister."

Sans paused mid-step but quickly recovered and ran to catch up with Itachi, "Not that I mind hanging out with the kid, but why do you want me to specifically 'have a chat' with her?"

"Well… She will be starting her first year at the ninja academy in a few years, and Father has been pressuring her to do better, as he puts his expectations for me onto her. I don't want her to get overwhelmed by the thought of surpassing me. You seem like a calm and powerful person, yet hold a warmth that I, myself, do not. You are a much better role model than I or Father could ever be."

Sans seemed shocked that someone he had just met put him on such a high pedestal; he didn't stay shocked for long though, as he gained a huge grin and swung his arm around Itachi's shoulders, "I think that you and I are gonna have a beautiful friendship."

Itachi simply nodded, "Quite."

* * *

**Meanwhile with Hiruzen and his council**

* * *

The Sandaime Hokage was currently outside the room used for the gathering of his council, he had a small folder full of things that would be present during the meeting, as well as references for the fake back story for Sans. He turned the knob to enter the room and he was greeted with the same drool room that plagued every meeting, it had virtually nothing in it, besides four chairs and a medium sized table. He then walked over and took his usual seat, which gave him a good view of his three council members: Mitokado Homura, Utatane Koharu, and Shimura Danzo.  
He sat his folder on the table and greeted the three, "Thank you three for coming. I'm glad to see you're all still well."

Homura in his typical, stubborn fashion quickly butted in, "If you would, cut the pleasantries and get to the point. I heard tell of a man being escorted by Inu's squad to your tower. What have you to say about these rumors?"

Hiruzen couldn't help but sigh at Homura's bossy nature, "That man is a refugee from Kiri that Inu's squad found during a mission, Inu had contacted me telling me that he was seeking asylum and I ordered him to bring him to me so that I may assess what clan he was from and how to go about integrating him into Konoha."

Koharu curtly nodded, pleased with his decision, "A wise choice, Hokage-sama, we do not have many clans here in Konoha and it would be a waste to see a clan parish. But, I must ask, what clan is he from?"

Koharu's polite behavior brought the smile back to Hiruzen's face, "Surprisingly, he is from the Kaguya clan."

At this point Danzo made his presence known by hitting the end of his cane on the ground, commanding everyone's attention, "The Kaguya you say? I have heard tell that they have perished long ago in a struggle with Kiri."

"His parents were rather different from the normal Kaguya and thus exorcised from the clan, they survived the purge for years, until they were finally caught and killed. In a fit of rage, he murdered the entire mob that killed his parents."

"Those Kaguya's are known for their thirst for battle, but how do we know that he will not be overcome with a desire to kill and attack a Konoha citizen?"

"He's a pacifist, as his parents were before him, that is why they were banished."

Homura chose to interrupt by slamming his hand into the table, "A pacifist Kaguya, what use is he to the village if his bloodline is used for combat!?"

Hiruzen scowled at Homura, "He is a pacifist, but as I said before he does have the ability to fight." He then reached into the folder and pulled out three papers, "I have brought a copy of his past for all of you, so that you may know about him for informed decisions later on. Now if you will, I'd like to get to the next topic."

Koharu simple bowed a little, "I'm sorry for Homura's behavior, Hokage-sama. Please, continue with what you were going to say."

Hiruzen quickly relaxed and gave a grateful look to Koharu, whenever Homura or Danzo riled him up, he could rely on Koharu to be his voice of reason. He became serious again very soon as he leaned forward, "Next I would like to talk about his placement here in the village. As I have found out he has no prior knowledge of ninjas or their techniques, but from Inu's report-" he paused to bring out said falsified report, "-he is very strong, helping Team Ro take out chuunin rank ninjas. So we cannot just let him into the academy, as he is too strong, but we can't just make him a ninja either. So what I am proposing is a temporary placement as a helper for a chuunin teacher at the academy, that way he can learn and we don't spend the resources on him to go though the normal exams. It will also help him to meet more children from Konoha clans and get used to how things are done in Konoha. Your thoughts."

Koharu was the first to state her opinion, "If you will allow me to take the stand. I find the idea of a newcomer near the ones who will one day rule various clans disturbing. However, I do also think that, from your description of him and a quick glance at the report, that his addition to the academy could be a valuable addition to their growth."

Homura quickly raised his voice at the idea, "From what I have heard so far, this 'Kaguya' is hardly fit to be a sensei, he is too non-molded to teach ninja!"

For the first time in the entire session, Danzo decided to chime in, "While I do agree with both points made, I feel that we will have to wait to see if his existence affects the students positively or negatively. His lack of training may just allow him to be malleable enough to be a perfect ninja."

Koharu nodded at Danzo's assessment, "Danzo is right, we should wait to see if he works well with the position. If the situation turns south, we could always just move him and get a replacement. We will never get anywhere in life by staying stagnant."

Hiruzen closed his folder before sitting back and pulling out his pipe, "I'm glad that your in agreeance with my decision. I feel as though he will be a wonderful addition to our ranks, albeit an abnormal one."

* * *

Sans and Itachi were still walking down the road, on their way to the Uchiha compound, as Itachi had taken the moment to tell Sans about the clan. For now it was quiet, Itachi was normally not very social, but Sans seemed to be lost in looking at the happiness spread across the faces of passersby. Itachi, noticing that it would still take a while to walk there looked towards Sans to ask a question that he had on his mind, "Oi, Sans, I was wondering about something." Sans seemed to be burst from his thoughts as he turned to look at Itachi with his head tilted, "It's kind of stupid, but, how can you eat? Aren't you just a skeleton?"

Sans gave an 'Ahhh' before nodding to himself and answering Itachi's question, "While I do not need to eat, I can because my soul can convert the nutrients into mana through a process named Alphisynthesis. From what I remember, it's basically just the soul breaking the food down by stripping it with any excess mana. I may be smart, but this shit ain't my field, I'm more of a mathematics guy."

Itachi seemed interested in the answer, but was rather confused about the conversion's name, "Alphisynthesis? Why was it named so?"

Sans let loose a chuckle, "It was an old colleague of mine, she was a scientist for the royal family of the underground. It was the first thing she fully discovered herself, so she named it after her…" His demeanor suddenly turned rather dismal, his grin leaving his face as he looked at the ground while he walked.

Itachi, seeing Sans' attitude shift, quickly apologized, "I'm sorry for bringing up old wounds… Were you two close?"

His face twisted into a rather bittersweet smile, "Were we close? Ha… You don't comfort a girl who lost her best friend or become lovers without being close… She really was a character, I still remember the nights where I stood up watching anime with her, comforting her after 'the incident.'"

Itachi put his hand on Sans shoulder, "Thanks for sharing, you didn't have to, but I appreciate the sentiment, and I also thank you for agreeing to talk with my sister."

Sans just shook his head and waved his thanks off, "No problem, man. Least I could do for someone who volunteered to show me around his home and taking me out to eat."

Itachi nodded his head before looking forward, "We're here." Sans could see a small house that seemed to be made of all would, the door was a shoji sheet sliding door and above it was an emblem of a fan with a white body and red tip. Itachi walked up to the door and opened it before calling to those inside, "Mother, I'm home, and I have a guest."

As Sans walked in behind Itachi he noticed the shoes near the door and quickly kicked off his slippers, as he did this a woman came running into the room and wrapped Itachi into a large hug. She had long, beautiful raven blue hair, her eyes had irises that were as black as coal; she was dressed in a knee length, long sleeved gray dress with a yellow apron over it. "Oh, Itachi, when I heard news of how your mission extended, I thought the worst… It's so good to see you're..." She quickly took notice of Sans, "…Safe. Itachi, who is your friend?"

Itachi pulled out of his mother's hug and motioned towards Sans, "Mother, this is Sans. Sans, my mother, Mikoto. Sans here is why my mission was delayed, we had to escort him to Konoha and I volunteered to show him around Konoha, but I needed to stop by and inform Father about why I was delayed."

Mikoto quickly nodded before shooing him upstairs, but before he left Itachi quickly leaned in and whispered something to her. "Before I forget." She spun around and held her hand out to Sans, "As you heard from Itachi-chan, I'm Mikoto, Uchiha Mikoto. It's nice to meet you."

He accepted her hand and bowed, kissing her knuckle, "My name is Sans, and the pleasure is all mine, Mikoto." He let go of her before putting his hands in his coat pockets, "So, I imagine that his meeting will take a while, do you have anywhere we could wait?"

She nodded and motioned for him to follow as she began to walk into the main room of the house. As they entered, Sans could see the small room with a simple couch and short table where a young girl was working on something. Mikoto quickly tapped on his shoulder, "You can wait here for Itachi, I have chores to do, so you'll have to make yourself comfortable."

Sans nodded to her and said goodbye before going over to sit on the couch, where the young girl was staring at him. She looked to be only nine years old, her hair was the same color as her Mikoto with the same big black eyes as well. Like Mikoto she wore a long sleeved, knee length dress, but it was black; unlike Mikoto, however, she kept her hair short with the bangs swept to the sides evenly. As he sat down he extended his hand towards her, "You must be Itachi's younger sister. He's told me a little about you." She said nothing, but accepted his hand anyway, before returning to what she was working on. "So… uh, what'cha working on, kiddo?"

She didn't look up or otherwise acknowledge Sans' question besides a quick, "Homework."

Sans chuckled sheepishly as he rubbed the back of his head, "What kind of homework? Not to toot my own horn, but I'm rather smart. I could help ya out, kiddo."

She turned to Sans, seemingly a little angry, "Stop calling me kiddo! I'm working on the academy entrance exam, if I want to get in early to be as good as Itachi, I need to get a ninety percent."

"Why do you want to get in early, kiddo?"

His question angered her even more, "I said to stop calling me kiddo! And besides, I already told you, I need to be as strong as Itachi, Father said that Itachi entered at nine and that I should be as strong as him."

Sans leaned forward to look at her in the eyes, "So, you want to get his approval…? Listen kiddo," he ignored her anger at the nickname, "when we try to get someone's approval, we tend to go in half-cocked… and it could lead to a mistake that could cost you dearly…" His face twisted into a somber expression as the anger the young girl felt wavered, "For a good bit of my life, I had nothing but my brother, I was happy and complacent with life. I let my strength waver until the day he died… I had a new purpose, to stop the person who killed him. With that I set out and met someone who I had begun to work for and eventually love, I watched as her friend died to the same person who killed my brother and I promised to get payback for the lives lost… I won't go into detail about what transpired after that but, the moral is that time is a precious commodity, never take it for granted… or you will regret it for the rest of your life… So, just wait until you're the proper age to go to the academy, make sure you're strong enough before you take life by the horns, make sure you can protect what you love…" Her eyes were widened at the speech he had just gave her, she had never expected for someone to come into her house and tell such a story, let alone have it be their life as a lesson, "Damn, look at me ranting at a kid, lets start over… Hi there, I'm Sans." He smiled gently as he softly held his hand to her again.

She grabbed his hand in a loose shake, "I'm Sasuke… Sorry for being rude, Sans-san…" she looked down at the ground in embarrassment and sadness.

She was brought out of her gloomy attitude when she felt a hand on her head, ruffling her hair. She quickly shoved the hand away and looked at Sans with surprise on her face. He chuckled at her, "Why ya so down, kiddo? You won't get anywhere in life if a little tears slow you down. Now how about I help with your homework?"

She pouted again at the nickname, before growling out, "I though you didn't want me to go to the academy early."

He just chuckled before ruffling her hair again, agitating her more, "Academy early or not, it will be good for you to know the material, kiddo."

With that she just puffed her cheeks in a pout before continuing with her work, with Sans helping… if you call puns help that is…

Outside of the room Mikoto stood next to the wall, smiling to herself at Sasuke making a friend, and potential tutor. She walked into the room and greeted the two, "Hello, you two having fun?"

Sasuke pouted, "I highly doubt that I could classify his presence as 'fun.'"

She was once again cut off by Sans ruffling her hair, "Hey, hey kiddo, you need to stop being such a stick in the mud, besides I'm helping you right?"

Mikoto merely chuckled at the two's routine of back and forth tomfoolery, but she quickly tapped on Sans' shoulder and whispered in his ear, "Fugaku and Itachi need you in the upstairs office."

He nodded before standing up and ruffling the young girls hair one last time, "Be good now, and remember what I said, kiddo." To which she just pouted and nodded.

* * *

"Are you sure about this Itachi, I will not toy with this idea if you any less than serious." A firm voice spoke belonging to a rugged man with shoulder length dark brown hair, his face was rather angled and had a strong chin with small eyes that seemed to hold firm at all times. This was Uchiha Fugaku he was the leader of the Uchiha clan, and father to Itachi and Sasuke.

Across from his small business table was Itachi, who was sitting on a dark matt. "I am quite sure, Father. He is far stronger than I, the most prodigal of Uchiha. He may have no ninja techniques but he had abilities that have never been seen in the history of the Ninja World…"

Fugaku crossed his arms as he thought about what Itachi said, "He may be strong, but to entrust a key member of the future of the Uchiha to his tutelage… It has me more than a tad concerned. On one hand, it could lead to a resurgence in the influence of the Uchiha name, but it could have long lasting effects… What I need to know is… do _you_ trust him, not the prodigy Uchiha, but Itachi the brother and son..."

Itachi stood firm as he gave his answer with all the conviction his body could muster, "With my own life, with the life of my team, and with the life of my most loved person in this world..."

Fugaku slowly closed his eyes as he processed his eldest's words, "…I see…" They were interrupted by a knock on the wall next to the door, "He is here then… Come on in, and have a seat." he exclaimed so that Sans could hear him from the adjacent side. As he entered Fugaku had to take in his appearance, he certainly did seem rather foreign, and without his son's express reassurance, he would never consider this. "Welcome…"

Sans seeing the man fish for his name extended his hand towards him, "Sans."

Fugaku accepted the handshake, "Ah Sans, well welcome Sans. How did your talk go with Sasuke?"

Sans looked to Itachi nodded towards him, he then turned back to Fugaku to explain the meeting, "Well, I had talked to her about waiting to become an academy student. She seemed rather protestant to it at first, but after a small story, I feel she understood what I was telling her. To become strong first so that she could protect those she loves."

Fugaku nodded his head, "I see, it is as Itachi said it was. He told me of his request for you to speak to her, I had been against it, but Itachi has always been a bright young man that did everything for a reason, so I listened to his ideas… The more he spoke of you the more I became interested. You are a rather standout individual according to Itachi: strong, wise, and efficient on the battle field… These are traits that Uchiha's strive to continue, we are defined by these characteristics… As you saw, while Sasuke is eager and talented, she is very green and has very undefined skills despite her quick learning. I want nothing but the best for all Uchiha, but even more so for my children… It shames me as a clan leader to ask this of an outsider, but… will you help with my daughter's development?"


	5. Chapter 5: Breaking the (Off)Ice

                                                                                                

* * *

 

The afternoon light glowed brightly over Konoha, draping the village in a warm blanket of heat, which was slowly dwindling due to the dying summer. In the village many were tirelessly working, and none more so than Sarutobi Hiruzen, the Sandiame Hokage. Ever since the meeting last night, he had been working on paperwork, preparing Sans' temporary citizenship and housing, as well as various documentation for the Academy. On top of all that, he had been attempting to write a letter to the Daimyo, in hopes to explain the situation and get his consent for the projects he had started. Despite already finishing much of the paperwork already, Hiruzen decided to wait, seeing as he was meeting with Sans today to inform him of the position he would be filling.

He had quickly been taken from his thoughts when his receptionist knocked on his door and peeked her head into the room, "Hokage-sama, there is a man named Sans here, he says that he has an appointment."

Hiruzen gave a small smile at the receptionist's announcement. Despite how much Sans' attitude reminds him of Kakashi, it's nice to know that he doesn't share his tardiness. Nodding to the young woman, he motioned for her to let Sans in, "Yes, that is correct. Could you inform anyone coming that I'm busy?"

"Hai!" She gave a small salute before fully opening the door and stepping back to reveal Sans, who simply looked at the old man and gave a lazy wave.

After giving the receptionist a small nod of gratitude, Sans walked into the office and sat down. "What's up, man?" He asked, before noticing the bags under the Hiruzen's eyes and the paperwork scattered across the desk. "Seems like someones been working themselves to the **bone** , huh?"

Hiruzen gave a small chuckle at Sans' little word play, "Yes, to the bone. The paperwork has been really busting my **knee caps**."

Sans gave a smile, "Finally, it's been too long since I've met someone who can enjoy a good pun or two."

But unfortunately, before the two could engage in more puns, Flowey popped out of the neck hole of Sans' shirt, with a face akin to frustration, "No, no, no. We are not fucking starting this. It's bad enough when Sans makes puns. I do not want you to to go starting this shit with the fucking Hokage, the man who we're going to be working under."

Sans gave off a disappointed sigh, "C'mon Flowey, don't be like that. I know somewhere deep inside that you love puns."

Flowey's face twisted into a sneer at Sans' statement, "Yes, Sans, somewhere deep inside of me I like puns. You know where that place is? Where that idiot Toriel is."

Sans shot Flowey a look, "Whoa, whoa, whoa, now, is that anyway to talk about your mother?"

Flowey let loose a scoff and rolled its eyes, "She hardly classifies my mother, more like grandmother if you were to think of Asriel and Chara as my parents. Alphys falls more in line with the mother role, as she did technically give me life."

Sans gave Flowey a hesitant glance, "So, you've been trying to have sex with the person who almost became your father in law? Didn't know you had an Oedipus complex."

He could feel the vines on his bones tighten as he finished that sentence, with Flowey's face adopting a slightly maddened look, "Oh ha ha. Make fun of the flower who struggles with severe bipolar disorder. And just to clarify, it would be more in tune with an Electra complex, although both are technically wrong."

The two were soon interrupted by Hiruzen coughing into his fist in hopes of disarming the awkward nature of their conversation, "Ummm, I think that we can save this conversation for later, after all, we have some important things to discuss..." Thankfully for Hiruzen, Flowey complied, but not before rolling its eyes. Sans gave the Hokage a thankful smile as he reached up and ruffled Flowey's petals, which prompted a small glare from the flower, that was quickly replace by a tiny smile. After giving a small sigh, Hiruzen began to rummage through the papers on his desk while talking to the two, "Now that, that is out of the way, we can start talking about what you will be doing here in the village. Firstly, with the help of my council, I have secured you a position in the academy as an assistant teacher."

Flowey, hearing what Sans' job would be, quickly interrupted the Hokage, "You're giving Sans a teaching position? Really? Without me he would have no idea about anything going on, why would you think he's qualified to teach?"

Hiruzen raised his hand in a placating manner at Flowey's question, "Well, luckily, the position he will be filling isn't really a teacher, he will be helping the main teacher with monotonous tasks, as well as teaching the children physical education, as that is one thing he does know decently well."

Sans nodded to himself before flashing the Hokage a grin and shooting him a finger gun, "Good to know that you kept my strengths and weaknesses in mind."

Hiruzen gave a small grin of his own, "Naturally, I'm not called 'The Professor' for nothing. Anyways, next will be another job that all ninja in the village have, and that is participating in missions. You two will be exempt from the normal requirements of mandatory missions per month, but you will still need to take any missions personally given to you by the Daimyo or I. Luckily for you, we won't need to call you in very often, due to how strong you are, so you will be the last option for any missions. The next thing that I wanted to discuss is your training, or more specifically Sans' training in the ninja arts. We can hide you behind the Kaguya bloodline for a long time, but you will eventually be expected to use ninja arts, especially when people recognize you as a Chuunin or Jounin."

Sans gained a contemplative look as he rubbed his chin, "So I'll need to learn to do those ninjitsu things. That means that Flowey will have to help me learn to use mana in a chakra-esque way."

Hiruzen nodded at Sans, "Yes, and to make matters more smooth, I'll even assign Kakashi to help you with anything that you need to learn."

Sans' contemplative look turned into a confused one as Hiruzen mentioned a new name, "Kakashi? I don't think I've heard of anyone with that name."

Hiruzen quickly understood Sans' confusion and corrected himself, "Kakashi is Inu's real name. Inu is just a code name that he got when he joined the ANBU corps." Sans' face became that of realization as he gave off a soft 'oh', but Hiruzen quickly made a new point known, "Those code names are to protect the people who silently defend Konoha, I'd like for you to keep any identities of ANBU agents a secret." Sans quickly nodded as he gave Hiruzen a thumbs up, "Good with that out of the way, lets talk about your hous-"

Before Hiruzen could finish, a ruckus made itself known outside the office as the secretary could be heard shouting, "No ones allowed in right now! The Hokage is having a meeting!"

Suddenly a new voice belonging to a young boy shouted back at the secretary, "Whatever lady! I'm gonna see the old man whether you like it or not!" Hiruzen looked over at the door with a weary expression, as Flowey quickly ducked back into Sans' shirt. The door shot open as a young boy with sun kissed blond hair ran into the room, stopping in front of Hiruzen as he began to practically bounce on his feet, "Hey Jiji! Guess what I got today!"

The Hokage sighed at the young boys interruption, but was quickly pulled out of any thought as he saw Sans stand up from his seat and stood behind the boy. Slowly Sans brought his hand up and gently tapped the boy on the shoulder to get his attention, "Ya know, kid, it's pretty rude to bust into someones office, especially when their having a meeting."

The boy quickly became irate, due to someone stopping him from telling the old man the good news, he began to give em a piece of his mind, "Oh yeah? And what gives you the right to… lecture… m-me..." As he turned around the words died in his mind as he saw Sans, who's hair was shadowing his eyes, leaving nothing to be seen besides the eerie, toothy smile that was plastered on his face.

"Now, now kid, is that the way you greet a new friend? Why don't you show a little courtesy," Slowly Sans extended his hand in front of him, "and shake... my... hand...?"

As he stood there Sans took in the boy's features, his tan skin slowly paling at the creepy feeling Sans gave off, his bright blue eyes widening in shock and a tad bit of fear, quickly the boy turned back to the Hokage and shouted, "Sorry for interrupting Jiji, I'll talk to ya later!" before running off, preferably anywhere away from Sans.

Hiruzen motioned for the secretary to shut the door as he turned his weary expression towards Sans, who was still standing, but looking at the door in embarrassment, "And, for what reason did you startle him like that?"

Sans' faux cheeks turned red as he sat down to answer the Hokage, "I didn't mean to scare the kid off, I was only setting up for the punchline of my classic prank..."

Hiruzen slapped his hand into his forehead as he let loose a large sigh, before slowly leaning his elbows on the desk while giving Sans an exasperated look. Before he could think of anything to say to him, Flowey, once again, popped out of Sans' shirt, however, this time it had a look of intrigue on its face, "Hiruzen, that boy, what would his name be?"

Hiruzen seemed to become a little confused at the sudden shift of topic, "Umm… Naruto, why?"

Flowey moved its leaves in a chin scratching motion, "Interesting. So this Naruto boy, he is close to you, yes? I mean he does call you grandfather, after all."

Hiruzen slowly nodded, "Yes, he is what you may call my 'surrogate' grandson. I have know him since he was a young boy, and even sponsored his admission into the academy."

"So you might understand what I'm about to ask then. Why does that boy have three souls?"

The hokage reeled back at that question, did they mean the kyuubi? And if so, why three souls? "I'm not quite sure. Could you please explain?"

The flower sighed, "That boy has three souls bound to his body. Though, it's more like two and a half. You see he has a regular human soul, but he also has something that seems akin to a monsters soul bound to him, with a human soul's shell encapsulating the pseudo-monster soul."

The old man hummed to himself as he leaned back into his chair, "Hmmm… What you are describing is very familiar, but you are accounting details that I know nothing about… I'll start with what this 'Pseudo-monster soul' is. What I believe you are seeing is the soul of the Kyuubi No Kitsune, a demon that attacked Konoha around eleven years ago."

Sans jumped into the conversation quickly at this news, "Wait a moment… So you're saying that he has the soul of a demon and, or monster in him… Why the fuck does a kid have something like that in him?"

"Well you see, the Kyuubi is a part of a group of demons called the 'Biju' or 'Tailed Beasts'. These demons have incredible powers that threaten life as we know it, so to both stop them and balance out the power of countries, Hashirama, the Shodaime Hokage, sealed the Biju into human containers, called Jinchuriki, and gave them to various villages as a peace treaty. When the Kyuubi attacked, we had no means to kill it, only to seal it in a human, and Naruto just so happened to get chosen."

Sans' face contorted into a frown as Hiruzen continued his explanation, none of this settled right in his mind. Seriously, you capture creatures against their will, seal them into people against both the creature and the person's will, then you call them a fancy name, and they're officially a piece of property, that fucked up man. "That some serious bullshit, dude. Whether you guys mean well or not, that is some serious, SERIOUS bullshit."

Hiruzen could do little other than nod at Sans' assessment, "You are correct, however it is not up to me to decide how the system works. Even though I admire him, I can attest to how foolishly trusting Hashirama was, and the future generation has to deal with the backlash of his mistakes. I've been trying to give Naruto a happy life, but only so much can be done, the system takes time to change." He took a quick break from talking so that he could smoke and calm his nerves, "But getting back on track with the conversation, now that you know about the Kyuubi, could you explain about the 'Human shell' you were talking about?"

Flowey nodded, "The shell around the Kyuubi's soul is a partial human soul. I say partial, due to the fact that it is not an actually human soul, merely an imprint of one. Do you know why the Kyuubi would have part of a human's soul?"  
Hiruzen hummed to himself as he place his hand upon his chin and began to search for any memory of the Biju's back story, though he sadly came back empty. Giving off a disappointed sigh, he turned his attention back to Flowey, "Unfortunately, no. We know a decent bit about the Biju, but we know nothing about what the really are, where they came from, or even their full physiology."

It was now Flowey's turn to hum in thought, "Interesting. Well, it should be noted that anytime we encounter another Jinchuriki, that we check to see if all Biju share this unique detail, or if it is solely the Kyuubi."

The Hokage nodded, before becoming a bit more chipper, "Now that all the really heavy stuff is out of the way, how's bout we get back to that talk. So about your housing. You're actually going to be staying in an apartment, that just so happens to be next to Naruto's." Suddenly the giant toothy grin spread across Sans' face, soon the prank will be fulfilled. Hiruzen, seeing Sans' face, immediately became weary, "Your going to do it again, aren't you? Just please don't scare him to death..."

Sans let loose a small chuckle, but otherwise kept his face hollow of emotion, "No promises for that, but I will promise that it will be **bone** -chilling."

Flowey groaned at Sans' pun, but could not scold him due to Hiruzen cutting them off, "Whatever, but that was everything that I needed you for Sans. If you don't have anything else to tell me, I will begin my questions for Flowey, so that I may produce a detailed report for the Daimyo."

Sans quickly wiped off the toothy grin from his face, as he quickly became serious. He needed to tell Hiruzen of his meeting with Fugaku. Not to inform Hiruzen, but to get answers for himself. "Actually there is one thing that I wanted to tell you..." He rubbed the back of his head looking for the right way to segway into his question, "You see before Itachi… Um what is Itachi's real name?"

Hiruzen looked a little embarrassed but responded either way, "Well… you see, his name and codename are both Itachi..." As he said that he could see the astounded look on Sans' face, "Yeah, I know that its really stupid, but in my defense, it's pretty funny, right?"

Sans sighed as he and Flowey both face palmed at the Hokage's flawed logic, "Okay, fine whatever… Anyway, before Itachi gave me a tour, he took me to his house, saying that he had to report to his father, while simultaneously asking for me to meet his sister, seeing as how she was pushing herself a little hardcore. That's not the problem though, ya see, after a little while, his mom came into the room and told me that Fugaku would like to meet me, so I went to talk to him for a little bit, seeing as how nice the rest of Itachi's family was. However, when I got to his meeting room, that is when things got a little strange..."

* * *

"… _will you help with my daughter's development?" At first Sans had been rather confused, why had Fugaku asked him for such a thing? What stood out about him that would garner such a request? These questions circled in Sans' head but were quickly shut out by what Sans saw._

_That look… That look in Fugaku's eyes was something he had not seen in a long time. Not since… the incident… That was the look of someone who was on death's doorstep, yet refused to simply give into death, but rather than fight, decided to give to the next generation…_

_And his voice… It held a saddened tone that had honestly froze him. It sounded sad, yes, but it held undertones of power and acceptance…_

_He knew what he could see in Fugaku's eyes and hear it in his voice… Determination…_

_Sans had been so shell shocked, so absolutely thunderstruck, that he could not look away, and he almost stayed that way, had it not been for Fugaku's impatient attitude, "I said, 'Will you teach my daughter?'"_

_Sans quickly shook his head in disbelief at the memories that assaulted him, before turning back to the Uchiha head, "I-I'm sorry, but I don't understand… Why would you ask me to do that? I'm just a person that was brought back to the village, why give me the task when you and Itachi are both so well versed in your ways?"_

_Fugaku's eyes closed as he turned his head skyward, "Itachi and I may be more well versed in the way of the ninja, but what Sasuke needs is much, much more than that. She needs a guiding hand, a light for whenever the path is dark, and we will not be there for her forever… We… No, I need to ensure that no matter what happens to me that the next generation, my daughter, will make it through in life, unplagued by the demons that have haunted our family for centuries." Sans' confusion grew exponentially the more Fugaku talked. Why was he speaking as if he was about to die? He seemed perfectly healthy. What was it that he knew that caused him to act in such a way? Again, all the questions in his head were silenced when Fugaku lost his patience, "So that begs the question, "Will. You. Teach. My. Daughter_? _"_

* * *

As Sans told his story, Hiruzen's face slowly took on a more stern and serious. It was clear to him that Fugaku knew a lot more than he let on in his few meetings with Hiruzen. He focused his serious expression onto Sans, "And, what did you say to him?" he inquired.

"I said that I would have to think about it. And after I said that, he looked… Disappointed in some way." Sans lowered his head, a feeling of internal confusion set in as he thought about whether he wanted to get more involved than he already was. He liked the kid, she was interesting and easy to ruffle up. She was a hard worker, so anything he did to help her train would stick like glue, but there was another thing wrong, not with her, but with himself.

As much as he liked her, she brought back some bad memories of another young girl who he took under his guidance, for a similar promise. He knew that he was being unfair and even a tad paranoid, but he couldn't help but feel weary of the situation. After all, old scars may fade, but they never disappear.

But, before he could dwell on the past anymore, he noticed movement out of the corner of his vision and looked back up, just in time to see Hiruzen's face as he put his hand on Sans' shoulder, "M' boy, I may not be as old as you, and I may not know fully what you went through in life, but I can recognize that face anywhere… It hurts, does it not? The regret, the agonizing guilt, the searing pain of betrayal… And the ever-present reminders that you could have stopped it all. Trust me, Sans, I know the feelings all too well."

Sans narrowed his eyes in self disgust, and turned his head, unable to face Hiruzen with the thought of his own failures, "Then you know why I am hesitant in my acceptance."

Hiruzen nodded to himself, "Yes, I do…" he said, before grabbing Sans' other shoulder, forcing him to look him straight in the eyes. As their eyes met, Sans was taken aback by the fire that was now shining within the Hokage's eyes, "And trust me when I say that, despite how much time passes, despite all the beautiful memories we make, the past will always exist. There is nothing we can do to change it, even though we would give anything to do so. But, we must continue on, not dwelling in the past, but looking towards the future. So, I beseech of you, Sans, take the offer. Rather than abstaining due your past mistakes, teach her to insure that her generation will not need to make the same mistakes you did."

Sans was absolutely astonished at Hiruzen's speech, his eyes could grow no wider, as he slowly looked inside of himself. Could he look past everything so easily? The answer was no, no he couldn't. He had seen too many die needlessly, he had lost too many friends because of his own inaction, and he couldn't just move on, as if nothing had happened. But, he would get nowhere living in the past.

Maybe if he did accept, then the transition would happen slowly.

Maybe he would be able to get some form of emotional healing.

Maybe everything would work out this time…

Maybe…

Either way, he needn't fester on the subject any longer, just as it was useless to focus solely on the past, it was useless to dream of the future. The world is shaped in the present, and he would be washed away and left behind if he festered too long.

Nodding to himself, Sans looked back into Hiruzen's eyes, this time with a fire of his own, "Thank you, Hiruzen. I needed that verbal slap to the face…" Losing the serious edge that he had a moment ago Sans closed his eyes and chuckled to himself while rubbing the back of his head sheepishly, "Just goes to show that even though I'm older, that doesn't mean that I'm wiser."

Hearing that, Hiruzen couldn't help but let loose a little chuckle of his own, "Indeed, Sans, you are a tad... **bone-headed**."

Hiruzen's pun cause a groan to escape Flowey's mouth, but the disguised skeleton didn't seem to care, as he continued to **pun** ish the flower, "We better stop while we're ahead, Hiruzen, anymore and Flowey'll be **rooting** for our deaths."

Hiruzen's face slightly paled, as he noticed Flowey's face redden and eye start to twitch at Sans' continuous dual-sided comments and puns. He needed to think quick, lest a dispute should arise, "Anywaaaay. Now that I helped you with that, Sans, I need to speak with Flowey. So, if you could refrain from antagonizing… him… her…" His attempt at playing peacemaker ended swiftly and embarrassingly, as he had come to realize that he didn't even know Flowey's gender. Slowly, with he cheeks aflame, he moved to ask the question on his mind, but was cut off by Flowey themselves.

"I'm a flower, Hokage-sama, I don't have a gender in the normal way that you humans do. But, should you really get down into the science of plants, I have only a carpel and no stamen, thus, in the plant world I am strictly female. So, for the simplicity of your feeble human language, I will allow you to address me as such." Flowey said, with… her… face looking completely disinterested.

Hiruzen, silently thankful for Flowey saving him from the humiliation of asking a flower if it were boy or girl, walk back to his desk and sat down, "Y-yes, anyways, don't antagonize her Sans. She is a beautiful flower, and deserves to be treated as such."

Flowey's face adopted a smirk, as she turned to give Sans a half dirty, half seductive look, "You heard the man, Sans…"

Hiruzen slammed his head into the desk, asking himself if he'll ever get through with this meeting, given how Flowey and Sans act around each other.

* * *

**Omake #1**

**"Say Hi to Fell for Me"**

* * *

 The world seemed gray, as all plant life seemed to have dwindled a long time ago.

Amidst a giant wasteland stood countless warriors, all clad in the uniforms of their countries.

Many were injured, with blood and dirt marring their clothes and hair, some were dead, but all those alive stood around a giant crater, which held a sphere in the center. The ball was black, but shined with navy blues and blood reds. It seemed to be made of something unnatural, unlike any solid or liquid one had ever seen.

However, for the figure trapped inside of the sphere, it could not see the outside wasteland, the people outside, or even the inside of the sphere. No all it could see was green, as letters, numbers, and even entire functions flew by at blinding speeds.

* * *

 

_**Systems offset by 523.42795%** _

_**Virus detected** _

_**Prompting auto detection…** _

_**Auto detection failure** _

_**Command prompt…** _

_**Activate file Corruption_Helping_Activation_ &_Reprogramming_** _ _**Apparatus** _

_**Activating file…** _

_**File successfully prompted** _

_**Systems offset by 1516161151116534843495451328^12356 X 10E%** _

_**System in total malfunction** _

_**System shutting down** _

_**Activating full manual override…** _

_**Open File location Alternate_Universe** _

_**AU00001** _

_**AU00002** _

_**AU00003** _

_**AU00004** _

_**AU00005…** _

_**Apply corrupted file to all in folder automatically** _

_**Updating status on command** _

_**Applying corrupted file 2 of 15647 (0.001%)** _

_**Applying to file AU002…** _

* * *

_**Name:** **Sans** _

_**Nickname:** **Fell** _

_**Universal Number:** **00002** _

_**Universe Name:** **Underfell** _

_**Occupation:** **Sentry/Guard and Hunter** _

_**Personality:** **Very, very aggressive, especially around humans and the weak.** _

_**Brief Bio:** **As a young skeleton he was always under his younger brother Papyrus, who had a knack for fighting and killing.** **Growing in the shadow of his hated brother, Sans had been on every short stick possible, the common people hated him, his brother beat and abused him, forcing him to watch as he killed innocent monsters. The pain in his life only grew as Papyrus grew through the ranks of the royal guard, his beatings would come more frequently, his abuse doubled, and the hatred from everyone grew. At some point he finally broke and gave into the insanity that lied within, he grew powerful, as the world was fueled by the notion of 'Kill or be killed.' As his brother noticed his growing power, he began to affirm his position, using Sans' new-found, boundless power to annihilate at his own leisure. Killing not only innocent monsters, but moving himself to more powerful positions in the guard, gaining wealth, and any other selfish desire he had. Despite the fact that it was Sans' power that gained him his status, Sans never saw a drop of the profits, but in his broken mind, he couldn't bring himself to care. He drowned his mind at the bar and in battles, dreaming of the day he could ravage the human world.** _

* * *

The night was dark in Konohagakure… Not only dark, but silent as well…

Unnaturally silent.

As a lone figure walked though the city, he looked around at what the once beautiful village had become. A majority of the houses were broken, some with but a large hole, while others were completely shaken to the ground, now resting in a pile of debris. The streets were lined with bodies, man, woman, child, it mattered not. Every body was twisted and distorted in some way, some more vile than other, but each one had its own unique form of disembodiment. One thing was for sure, you couldn't look for a few block without seeing blood and viscera blemishing the pavement.

Despite how grotesque the village looked, the figure did falter in his steps, not even so much as batting an eyes at the destruction that carved the village.

Due to the eerie silence, each step of his shoes made a deafening noise, but despite this, he could hear something else, the faint sound of baited breath. The faint sound of a woman, gasping for breath despite her wounds.

That's right, he was hunting right now.

He was hunting an injured doe that he set free in the wild.

Slowly he made his way towards the corner of the building he was next to, and given the volume of the breathing right now, he was right around the bend from his prize.

Wanting to keep the game fun, he made sure to step even louder as he approached where he knew the woman was. Keeping his excitement down he pretended to walk passed her hiding spot, which was the counter of a street vendor's shop. As he walked further away, he could hear her cautiously move from the counter, in an attempt at sneaking away.

Chuckling to himself, he decided to remind her of his presence, "Ya know, I feel bad not given ya a fair chance." The sound of her footsteps stopped, and her breathing became even more withheld, at hear his broken but commanding voice, "So tell ya what, I'll give ya a ten second head start…" Despite his words, the woman stood still, as if she suspected his words to be a trick. Oh, how keen she was. But keenness didn't mean shit so he began his countdown, whether she ran was her choice. "Ten..."

As soon as she heard that, she bolted, running as fast as she could with her injuries.

"Nine..."

She ran and ran and ran, despite the panic she felt, she couldn't think right now, she could do little more than mindlessly flee for her life.

"Eight..."

She had just crossed a second street, putting a good bit of distance between her and her assailant.

"Seven..."

As she ran further and further, his voice carried less and less strength. She could feel the distance and her confidence grow larger by the second. Eventually, when she could no longer hear his voice, she ducked down into an alleyway, hiding once again, but this time behind dumpster. She began to slowly take in breath, as to not wind herself and cause her breathing to get worse. Taking a moment she peeked from behind the dumpster, looking for the one who had been chasing her.

"One… Looks like you're out of time."

The woman froze, slowly turning her head around only to come into contact with the black shorts of the man who had been hunting her. Rather than fight or even attempt to flee again, the woman cowered grasping the man's shorts as she cried, "P-Please! Don't do this!"

Rather than giving her words the time of day, he pulled free from her grasp and brought his knee up to meet her face, which knocked her down on the ground, clutching her face and crying even harder. Growing impatient with her bawling, he put his foot down, forcibly on her shoulder, dislocating it and causing her to scream. Yet again without batting an eyelash, he asked her a question, "C'mon now, don'cha have any better reason for me to spare ya?"

The woman nodded her head as the pained expression never left her face, "I-I'm… P-pregnant… I-if you have any compassion in your heart, please, spare me and my unborn child!"

That information raised an eyebrow for the figure, and he looked down at his captive, shifting his leg so that he may get a closer look at the woman. And indeed her gut was swollen quite a bit, she was most likely several months along her pregnancy. Slowly he brought his hand down to touch the woman's stomach, which she feebly tried to stop, and as he touched it, he could feel a small kick from the child, almost as if it were happy to meet him.

He drew back and allowed a small feeling of happiness to grace his mind, before extending his hand and forming a bone with a sharpened edge. He kneeled down next to the woman, who was now screaming even harder, not in pain, but in panic. He put his hand back on the woman's stomach, and instantly the baby kicked back in a playful manner, not understanding what was about to happen. As he raised the hand that held the bone, the other hand began to stroke the woman's belly, causing the kicks to become more sporadic. The woman's screams now hit an all time high, begging him to spare them, and for him to stop what he was doing. However her useless screams were silenced when he drove the sharp bone down, impaling the woman's stomach, killing her child before it was even born.

The woman's cries became whimpers, as her attempts at struggling stopped, just like her motherhood. The tears freely fell from her eyes, as she could only mutter one thing to her child's killer, "W-why…?"

The man let out a chuckle as he stood up and pointed the baby-blood covered bone at her face. But before he killed her, he gave an answer…

"In this world… **It's kill or be killed!"**

(And now a picture so you can see the face of a  **Real** monster)

                                                                                           


	6. "Making Out" a Plan

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'M NOT DEAD YET, BOY!

All was calm throughout Konoha, the birds were singing…

The flowers were blooming…

“HOW MANY TIMES DO I HAVE TO TELL YOU!? ITS PRONOUNCED ‘DAI-MYO!’ NOT ‘DIME-YO!’”

…

Well except for Flowey, of course… She was currently busy teaching Sans Japanese… and failing miserably.

“Ya know, shoutin’ ain’t gonna help~”

It had been a month’s time since Sans arrived in Konoha, and most of the past month had been dedicated to his Japanese and history lessons, which Flowey had provided, much to her chagrin. But, despite all the constant screw up by Sans during his Japanese lessons, he had actually manage to learn quite a bit of this ‘world’s’ history, although it did cost him a LOT of his time (literally, he hadn’t been able to even furnish his apartment, he slept on the floor.)

The history of these ninja had actually been quite interesting! From the start, most of the world had been ninja, whether they liked it or not, simply because they had to train to survive. This era in history was referred to as the ‘Waring States Period.’ If you weren’t apart of an empire or a ninja clan, then you were essentially open to danger at all points.

Though, this era came to a close quickly after two ninja clans formed a peace agreement, and formed what would be the first ninja village. Together, the Senju and the Uchiha clans, lead by Hashirama and Madara respectively, came together and built Konohagakure no Sato. Hashirama became the body of the village, creating the forest that surrounds the nation and concealed it, while Madara became the soul of the village, with his intense political knowledge, he formed the base of all hidden village laws and even constituted a bill of rights for the people in it. And eventually, people congregated there, seeking refuge and stability from the cruel world that they had been forced to live in for most of their lives.

This led to an outbreak of other villages also being constituted, most following the formula that had been created by Hashirama and Madara. And with time, the empires of the world began to respect these settlements, allowing them to remain free, but also providing them with protection and funding. Truly, the future had never looked so promising…

However, that would not last long. As the villages grew, demand for a leader became ever present, but the village of Konoha had two founding fathers. With the election coming forth, a stake had been driven between the two, which would only increase when the leader was decided. Madara Uchiha, the man many considered to be the strongest human to have ever existed, a genius far beyond his time, and ultimately the entire backbone of the political system of Konoha…

...Had lost.

Despite all the achievements he had accomplished in his life, despite all he had done and sacrificed to make the village, he had lost to Hashirama, a man who, even though strong, was completely inferior to Madara in every way. The reason that he had lost, was no problem in turn with him, but rather with Hashirama, even though Madara was superior, Hasirama was a breath of fresh air: a symbol of optimism and hope, much to Madara’s anger. In the years that had come, Madara had been very supportive of Hashirama in his reign, although he had been quoted numerous time saying “While I do not regret founding a symbol of peace, I have come to regret being so hasty in accepting blind fools.”

However, the final straw had been pulled when it was revealed that Hashirama’s successor would be Tobirama, his little brother. For the last time, he had put up with playing second fiddle, he had gone to his clan, as well as the other clans, in hopes of speaking _some_ semblance of sense into them. Alas, it was all for naught…

He had told the clans that Tobirama was to be the next Hokage, and preached his case, that having multiple Senju’s taking the throne one after another would go against the founding scripture of Konoha. The Hokage’s position was never supposed to be a matter of what family you came from, how much money you had, or even your rank. Hashirama’s decision to elect his brother as Hokage, would jeopardize everything that this village stood for, creating a dynasty rather than an elegant system of elected officials.

However, none of them listened… Instead they gave him a cold shoulder, and turned a blind eye to Hashirama’s faulty leadership. His clan even began to go as far as calling him a traitor to the cause of the village.

With the quickly crumbling village at his fingertips, Madara washed his hands of the mess and left, becoming the first ever missing nin in existence. For the rest of their lives, Hashirama and Madara would meet and battle, endlessly, always getting stronger… Until the time came and Madara summoned the Nine Tailed Demon Fox, the Kyuubi, to assist in killing Hashirama once and for all. And many do not know what happened thereafter, but many assume that after both were severely weakened, that Hashirama’s wife, Mito Uzumaki, had sealed the Kyuubi within herself, allowing for both to continue on equal footing, until they both died in the battle. Some, more speculative people, say that their battle is still continuing today, ever evolving and morphing.

The story of Hashirama and Madara was something gave Sans quite the food for thought. On many counts, he adored Hashirama’s love for the world and trust for those who inhabit it. But on the other hand, he sympathized with Madara, pouring ones life and soul into something to make the future bright, only for those who it helps to shun you. And it only made matters worse when Flowey had told him that many historians actually don’t even have the full facts, labeling off Madara’s work and making him out to be a villian… It just didn’t sit well with him...

But, that’s about as far into the history as Sans was now, there had been a _lot_ of political babble between important sections. From what Flowey had told him, he still had quite the ways to go till he had fully finished learning everything. Which leads to today’s verbal lashing that Flowey was delivering.

Yeah…

Apparently Japanese was important to know… Even though pretty much everyone spoke english, and very few people knew only Japanese.

So, as Flowey continued blathering on, Sans just simple thought back on the past month. As one might expect, due to Hiruzen’s help, Sans had decided to take young Sasuke under his wing. He had actually gone to the Uchiha’s residence that same day to inform Fugaku about his decision.

Despite his initial reluctance to allow Sans to train his daughter, Fugaku seemed to be genuinely relieved when he got the news. So, Sans had been over about twice a week to “train” her. Realistically, she was far too young to go through more than basic training, so Sans mostly sat around and gave her pointers and, unknown to her, slightly amplified gravity on her to be just a tad heavier. And, despite her rather rude disposition, Sans knew that behind that faux visage of her father, was a very sweet young girl… he just didn’t know how to bring her out yet.

And Sasuke wasn’t the only one to receive training, after all Sans had begun learning about jutsu and chakra under Kakashi. At first it was rather strange for Sans to learn what chakra was, it was a combination of soul energy and physical energy. For all of his time in the underground, he had only understood mana, which was the energy of one’s soul, but no one had ever heard of this physical energy. So, they began to look into a way to use said power, which still had no answer, but breaking nature took a while.

Sans’ thoughts, and Flowey’s rambling were interrupted by a knock on the door to the apartment. Flowey quickly receeded back into Sans’ clothes as he stood up and opened the door, revealing Kakashi, who gave a small wave.

“Yo, Sans-kun, how’s it hangin’?”

Sans gave his own lazy wave, “Well I’ve been in better situations.”

“Flowey?” His voice became flat, and his lone eye was half lidded, he knew how much Flowey hated teaching. And Sans didn’t bother to say anything, instead he gave a single finger gun in response, which made Kakashi chuckle, “Well either way, I just wanted to tell you some things. Firstly, Hokage-sama would like to see you.”

“Any idea what he wants?”

“Jiraiya-Sama is in Konoha this month, and I assume he wants to meet you and make sure the seals hiding both of your energy levels is up to snuff.”

Sans’ eyebrow raised at the semi-familiar name, “Jiraiya…” he lowly hummed to himself thinking back to where he heard the name from, “Wait, didn’t Hiruzen mention him at one point?”

Kakashi nodded, “Indeed, he’s quite the fellow, a renowned seal expert, has the biggest spy network in the world, a novelist. He was even trained by Hokage-sama himself, and went on to teach the Forth Hokage.”

Sans gave a soft whistle at the list, he sure did have quite the repertoire, “And he’s here to make sure me and Flowey are concealed right?”

“Yep, and he’s also very interested in meeting you, form what I heard.”

Sans cocked an eyebrow, “Really, why?”

Kakashi gave a soft grunt and a shrug, “I’m not sure, maybe he wants to see if you’re a threat to the village?”

Honestly, it made sense, he was just a random monster who lived in a cave most of his life, “Well, I guess I shouldn’t leave ‘em hanging.”

But before he could go, Kakashi put his hand out in front of him, telling him to stop, “Matte, matte. I said that was the first thing, I actually wanted to ask you something else too.” Sans gave a soft smile as he nodded for Kakashi to continue, “You see, a bunch of Konoha’s finest are going to a gather to celebrate Kenkoku No Hi, or the Day of Founding. I figured, since your still new here, getting to know some of the Chuunin and Jounin would be nice. Plus, a friend of mine is a master of all thing taijutsu, so he could give ya some pointers for your PE class.”

Sans grimaced to himself, “Kakashi, I wouldn’t mind but… I’m supposed to be training Sasuke today.”

He just gave a small chuckle, “They may be Konoha’s finest, but some have apprentices of their own, so she won’t stand out. Plus there won’t be any alcohol, Kenkoku No Hi is always celebrated with tea instead of sake.”

Sans put his hand up to his chin, it might be a good idea. Sasuke, didn’t do much training outside of studying and polishing her skill, so it might be good for her to get to mingle with some other students and maybe even some teachers. Plus, he could get a _lot_ of help with his teaching dilemma.

Quickly saying ‘fuck it’ to himself, Sans gave a shrug and smirk, “Ah, why the hell not, right?”

Kakashi’s lone eye closed and in what seemed to be…relief… or joy… kinda hard to tell… “Good, just so ya know, the meeting is at Dango-ya, and it doesn’t start til’ about five, so you can get your business done.”

Sans gave a chuckle and let his mouth settle into a smirk, “Cool, so anything else you wanna tell me before I go?”

“Nope.” His eye reopened to look at him with a lazy gaze, “By the way, you want a lift to Hokage-sama’s office?”

Sans gave a smirk as he waved off his question, “Nah, just make sure ya close the door, alright?” And without a moments hesitation he blinked out of existence.

Kakashi stood still for a couple seconds, before shaking his head, “Mah, mah, what a host! Making his guest see himself out.”

* * *

In his office, Hiruzen was currently talking with man who seemed to be in his late forties, he wore a pale green kimono top and matching pants with a sleeveless, red haori with to yellow circles on each side of the front opening. Absent was the usual gloves and sandals most ninja wore, instead he had hand guards and wooden sandals with high stands. His hair was wild and spiky, with two shoulder length bangs that framed his face and headband, the back of his hair was put into a low ponytail that draped over the scroll that was held onto his back.

“So, what do you think Sensei?” The man said, with his pride and happiness clear in his voice, as he folded his arms.

Hiruzen, who’s rapt attention was fixated on a book clung tightly in his hands, didn’t even bother to look him before replying, “A masterpiece as always, m’ boy!” He pulled back and blush a tad at a particularly spice part, “Oh ho ho, Rika-chan you dirty girl!”

The man gave a hearty laugh at Hiruzen’s excitement, “Yeah, I figured you’d like that scene!” though the merriment of the two men was swiftly interrupted by Sans popping into existence behind Hiruzen’s chair.

He gave Sans a confused look, but Hiruzen had yet to notice, due to his nose being stuck in his book. After a brief moment of taking in his surroundings, Sans gave the man a cheeky look before holding his index finger to his lips in a silencing motion. His white haired fellow gave a nod and an equally foxy grin, “Ya know, the next couple pages only get better, Sensei!”

Hiruzen’s mind seemed to run wild, better than this beauty? IMPOSSIBLE! But it sounded so tempting! With little hesitation he quickly turned the next page, intent on seeing this forbidden fruit, unknowing to the fact that Sans stood over his shoulder looking at the book with him.

A few minutes of silence passed, and as Hiruzen was about to turn the page again, Sans piped in, “Hold on one sec, I’m not done...”

Without thought, Hiruzen nodded, “Oh, pardon me.”

Reading a few more lines, Sans gave a whistle at the steamy action, “Damn, Rika sure is flexible.”

The old perv gave a giggle, “Rika-chan has always been amazingly lim...” Slowly the Hokage realized that this was not his guest talking and slowly turned to see Sans’ smiling face, “...ber...”

Sans gave a lazy wave, “Yo”

Suddenly, Hiruzen fell over the arm of his chair, screaming and clutching his chest all the way down. Both of the white haired men began to laugh at his misfortune, as he laid on the ground trying to calm his old heart. After they stopped laughing and while they waited for Hiruzen to recover, Sans looked to the ground, at the book he had looked at earlier. The cover was red and depicted a woman kicking away a man, who seemed to be courting her. It seemed interesting, especially when you tied it with the steamy way it was wrote, but one thing stood out to him. The book was a lot like the one Kakashi read, Make Out Paradise.

Sans picked up the small book and gave it a once over, it was called Make Out Violence, which pretty much confirmed that is was in the same series as Kakashi’s copy. But… that made him immensely curious as to what book contained that would attract the attention of someone like Kakashi… Besides the obvious of course. And as he looked at it, the man who helped him prank Hiruzen appeared beside him, with his arm slung around San’s shoulder, “So, what did you think of my masterpiece?”

Sans was a little unsure of how to answer, and gave a soft shrug, “I’m not too sure. I’ve never really read anything like this before… The whole book isn’t just smut right?”  
A brief chuckle greeted his question before the novelist replied, “Hardly, my friend! The book is a sequel to the first novel. The main character is actually the sister of the first books antagonist, who now lives in hiding with a group of merchants. At first she is quite vengeful and quite antagonistic to the kingdom that took power, but slowly she begins to settle in with the villagers she meets on her journey, and falls for a young man that travels in another caravan. Its quite the down to earth and lovely story… that just so happens to have a fair share of steamy scenes.”

Sans looked down at the book, clearly intrigued at the juxtaposition of the man’s writing, both serious and story driven, but with a more ‘fun’ and spicy style. “Interesting… I was sure that it would just be the overly saturated “porn with a stupid and ridiculous plot” kinda thing.”

Quickly drawing his arm back, and his face contorted into a fake rage, “How dare you, sir!? What in the right mind would lead to such an assumption!?”

Sans just smirked, and simply said, “I’ve watched a lot of hentai.”

Away from the two’s antics, the forgotten Hokage had finally gotten his breathing under control, and immediately jumped up to chastise Sans over his antics, “Sans, what the absolute fuck do you think your doing!? Scaring an old man like that, I could’ve had a goddamn heart attack!” Sans rubbed the back of his head sheepishly, giving a light apology. But Hiruzen was not done, he quickly whipped around to the other male, “And you, Jiraiya! You would play along with this, scaring your own sensei like that!? I’m severely disappointed in you!”

The man, now named Jiraiya, put his hands up in a placating manner at his teachers rage, “Sorry, Sensei, it was too funny to pass up!”

Sans quickly inserted himself back into the conversation, “So you’re the mythical Jiraiya I heard about?”

Jiraiya chuckled a little bit at the phrasing, “I am not just the mythical Jiraiya. I am the one that lesser men fear! The ladies swoon when I walk near! Conqueror of elements! Master of fuinjutsu! I AM JIRAIYA, THE TOAD SAGE OF MOUNT MYOBOKU!” His charade ended as a cloud formed and he reappeared, posing on top of a large toad.

Hiruzen noticeably face-palmed at his students antics, while Sans gave a small smile for his effort. Though, Sans was quickly enraptured by this toad that had appeared from nowhere, and he walked up to it and began to poke it with a questioning look on his face, “So, is this that thing Kakashi was talking about? The uh… summoning thing?”

Jiraiya gave a nod, now sitting upon his toad, “Indeed, I am the retainer of the Toad summoning contract after all. And you must be Sans, right?”

This time it was Hiruzen who butted in, “Yes, Jiraiya, this is the person I wanted you to meet. ANBU operative Neku put a seal on the inside of his jacket to hid his energy level, but I want you to make sure it is up to standard.”

The frog man gave a nod, as he jumped down and received the jacket from Sans. As he began to double check the seals, he gave a soft grunt to get Sans’ attention, “Hey, Sans. I got a quick question for you.”

“Shoot.”

“So you’ve lived for hundreds of years, right?” Jiraiya asked, getting a nod from the disguised skeleton, “What were humans like back in the old days? Did they have access to chakra or did they have the mana that you do?”

Sans put his hand on his chin in thought, “Well, to be honest I only ever knew one human, and she didn’t have anything close to the chakra you all have. But, she was mana sensitive, and could even control time to some extent.”

Jiraiya’s eyes seemed to bug out of his head when he heard Sans, “Control time!?” Sans nodded, “First you can control gravity, then a girl who controls time, what was earth like at that time!?”

Sans gave a chuckle, “Well, I said she could only control it to an extent. From what I gathered from my colleague’s research on her, she could only use it at the time of her own death.”

“Intriguing! But, I believe we are getting off subject, so she didn’t have any chakra, only mana?”

“Like I said, I didn’t detect any, however I also can’t detect yours, only your mana and soul.”

“By the way, you seals are all good.” He handed Sans back his jacket, before humming in thought, “So, its a possibility that humans had chakra way back when?”

“Perhaps I could answer that.” Suddenly, Flowey popped out of Sans’ shirt and gave a smirk to the toad sage.

Jiraiya gave a questioning look to the flower, “So you know?”

“Partly. I have a few memories from my ‘parents’, and one of them happened to be a human.”

“Why do your parents matter?”

Flowey scoffed at being interrupted, “I was born from their dead bodies and I have some of their memories, don’t interrupt me again.” Flowey ended the sentence with a raspy hiss, causing Jiraiya to back off, “Now, he lived above ground until he was about eleven, so my reelection is fuzzy at best, but from what I do remember, human at the time treated literally anything with a semblance of ‘magic’ as the plague itself. They would attempt to kill anyone who had a trace of it. So I’m guessing that they wouldn’t be so bigoted about something as silly as magic, if they could control chakra.”

Jiraiya slumped forward, feeling a little somber from Flowey’s description of humanity, “You’d be surprised how easy people are to hate the unknown… I guess times really haven’t changed...”

“It’s hardly a problem for just humans, in the underground we had a monster who was very, very amendment about killing and starting war with humans. It’s a problem with sentience and idiocy more than anything. But regardless,” Jiraiya perked back up, ready to hear the next bit of info, “After about five years of living in that cave with Sans, I began to move about the world outside, and I had not encountered anyone with chakra, but there had been rumor of a priest who began to teach people about some kind of enlightenment.”

Jiraiya hummed to himself, “Hmm… That sounds awfully similar to the story of the Rikudo Sennin...”  
He stopped his thoughts and turned back to the flower, “Thank you for the info. Our knowledge of history is a little limited due to all the wars, politics, and other such things, but this information might just be a good starting point to uncovering the truth!”

Flowey brushed off the man’s thanks, “If you want to thank me, then I need a favor. You see, I may know a lot about your worlds history, but I know next to nothing about how your chakra truly works.”

Jiraiya smirked, as he held his chin in a smug fashion, “So you need to know about the wonders of chakra?”

The flower gave a chuckle at the man’s constant attitude shifting, “Indeed, but for Sans’ sake rather than my own. I have the ability to use my energy to do these jutsu you ninja use, but no matter how hard we try, Sans is unable to do anything of the such. We were hoping that you could take the time to see if there is anyway to fix this issue.”

“Hmm… So you two have the same energy, but only one of you can use jutsu…?” At the duo’s nods, he continued, “Alright, no problem then. I’ll give it a look.” He pulled out two pieces of paper, and began to mark them, “I need you two to channel some energy into these papers, and I’ll see what I can discover… But don’t expect results, I’m not a scientist.”

Sans smiled, and stuck his hand out to Jiraiya, “It doesn’t matter, so long as you try to help us, you’re good in my book.”

“Alright then, glad to help.” Jiraiya moved to accept Sans’ handshake, “I can feel the beginning of a beautiful friendshi-” He paused mid-sentence, because as soon as he shook Sans’ hand, a fart sounded out in the office.

Jiraiya stood with his mouth agape, as Sans showed his palm, which had a small button with a speaker, “The ol’ whoppie cushion in the hand trick. Works every time.”

* * *

‘ _Makin’ my way down town~_

_Walking fast, faces pass~_

_And I’m homebound~_

_Dun nuh uh nu-nu-nu-nuh~’_

Sans hummed to himself as he was leisurely walking through Konoha with his nose in a copy of Make Out Paradise that Jiraiya had given him. He was supposed to be headed to the Uchiha complex, but he couldn’t help but take a peak at the book that arrested the attention of the masses. And, honestly, this book seemed to be of much lesser quality compared to the tidbit he read from the second. It focused more on the smut and sexual appeal than story, which I guess is understandable for someone’s first time writing, but there was one thing that stood out to Sans and he couldn’t really understand it…

Why did so many women in this book have such ludicrously sized boobs?

Did humans find this alluring? Because, to Sans it honestly seemed rather strange. Then again, he lived underground and in a cave for all his life, and monsters didn’t exactly have a reason to evolve breasts… It wasn’t like a lizard would just gain breasts if it became sentient and bipedal.

Eventually Sans just decided to look passed it, calling it a cultural thing, and just read it as he walked. As he made his way though the village, he got numerous looks from various women, who knew of Make Out Paradise and were not fans of his literature choice, and from men who acknowledged his expertise in the art of manly smut reading. But he paid no attention to his surroundings, as his mind drifted to thoughts about today’s celebration, Konoha’s Founding Day. All around the village, he could see the buildings lined with Hi no Kuni’s national flag, (a white flag emblazoned with the kanji for fire,) and parade floats with kites in the form of chibi versions of the influential figures of Konoha. (Hashirama, Tobirama, etc.)

But, it felt… strange.

He was an outsider, completely opposite of any citizen of Konoha, and yet he was about to celebrate a long held holiday for this villages’ people… Hell, even some people who have lived in Konoha for their life, and give up their blood and sweat, wouldn’t get the chance to celebrate the holiday that they honestly deserved… It felt like he was infringing on their lives…

Sans sighed to himself at the thought… but, it wasn’t like this was his first time having to adapt to a new life. And the lingering feeling of self guilt will pass with time…

But Sans wiped his mind of depressing thoughts as he heard a familiar voice, “Yo, Sans m’ dude!” Came a cheery sounding voice from the shadows. And, try as he might, Sans couldn’t see the man, but was able to sense the mana within his body.

Suddenly, Sans disappeared, only to appear on top of one of the buildings roofs, right behind a young man who wore a black high-collared, short-sleeved shirt with the Uchiha emblem on the back. His hair was messy and unkempt, but was held up with a Konoha headband.  
Sans’ face twisted into a smirk, “I thought you knew that you can’t hide from me, Shisui.”

Slowly the young man turned around with a sheepish look on his face, and holding his hands up, as if to surrender, “Gomen, gomen! Sorry dude, but you know me! Always looking to do some goofs!”

This was Shisui Uchiha, a man who quickly became good friends with Sans, and was actually Itachi’s best friend from a young age. It wasn’t hard to understand why they got along so well, Shisui was always a chill and joking guy by nature, and it only was amplified by Sans’ own japes. Not to mention, Shisui had the brightest soul one could ask for. It shined so beautifully, with green and orange flowing together, living in absolute harmony as they worked together to make the world happy.

Sans shook his head at Shisui’s constant lack of seriousness, “Well Shisui, ya done goofed, so ya might as well get down from here and walk with me to Itachi and lil’ Sasuke’s place.”

With a nod, Shisui and Sans jumped down from the building and began to walk again, before Shisui patted Sans on the shoulder, “I know you get tired of me askin’, but how do you always find me, dude?”

A chuckle escaped Sans’ lips, as he turned around, walking backwards, and gave his friend the classic ‘double pistol and wink’, “I can’t go gettin’ rid of all my secrets now.”

Limping forward and groaning at Sans’ cheeky attitude, Shisui couldn’t help but mumble out, “Ya know, it’s stuff like that, that makes Sasuke rage debate to herself about which of us is better.”

That information caused Sans to trip up in his stride, before righting himself and giving an exasperated sigh, “For real? She’s still doing that…?”

This had become quite common since his induction into the world of ‘Sansei hood. (yes that is a pun on Sans and Sensei) Sasuke had always liked to make a big fuss about which of the three of them, Itachi, Shisui, and Sans, was the strongest… Usually Itachi was the winner, seeing as Sasuke was totally starstruck in her brother’s presence, but luckily Sans had been coming up as the winner a few more times on average.

Shisui gave a brief nod, “Oh you wouldn’t believe, dude… It’s always ‘Itachi this’ and ‘Sans that’… no love for the Shister.”

Sans’ features flattened out into a pure deadpan, “Maybe if you didn’t call yourself ‘the Shister,’ she’d like you more?” Sans’ suggested much to Shisui’s despair, “But, either way, I wanted to ask ya’ something.”

Shisui’s face contorted into a look of intense thought, “Hmm, I don’t know… Should I allow you a question after that last offensive remark about my person?” Shisui asked, in retort to Sans’ earlier betrayal, before his face instantly lightened up, “Gomen, Gomen! But yeah, ask away dude!”

“You doin’ anything for Founding Day?”

Shisui sighed, as he was reminded of today’s celebration, “Yes, unfortunately. Ya see, the police force doesn’t have enough officers to keep a tab on the villages security during a big event like this, so they asked fellow shinobi to enlist for the day, so Itachi and I volunteered our time.” At this information Sans’ eyes traveled to the dirt, feeling the same, lingering feeling of guilt. Shisui quickly caught Sans’ expression and put his arm around the sorrowful skeleton, “Yo, yo, yo! No need to look down man! Just cuz’ your gonna be out there enjoyin’ yourself, and we’re working, shouldn’t make ya feel guilty. I mean, someones gotta do it, right?”

Sans smiled a little bit at Shisui’s attempt at cheering him up, and even though he was still feeling a little down, he wouldn’t show it to Shisui, “Thanks, broseph.”

Shisui gave off that insufferably charming smile of his, “No prob, my dude! … But, since you asked me, I guess I should ask you. What’re you doin’ tonight?”

“I’m going to a dango shop with Kakashi and some of his buddies I guess… I’m not too sure who will be there, but Kakashi said that a taijutsu master would be, so I wanted to swing my plans for the academy course by and see what he thinks.”

Shisui nodded to himself, “That sounds cool ‘n all, but… when does this happen?”

Sans quickly pulled out his phone from the pocket that it resided within, and checked the time. “It should start in about an hour or so.”  
Shisui’s brow rose, “And your swinging by the Uchiha district… why? If you’re gonna cancel Sasuke’s session today, you could’ve just called.”

Chuckling to himself, Sans turned to look at the house of the Uchiha Head, not too far in the distance, “I’m actually gonna have Sasuke tag along with me. Some of the people there have apprentices of their own, and I wanted her to get to know some kids around her age… Besides, she and I could use a break from constantly training, and there’s no better way to bond than at a festival.”

Shisui gave Sans a sideways look as they came near the front door, “You do realize that you’re gonna be at the bottom of the tier list for a while after you make her stop training?”

Sans gave a soft sigh, “Oh well, if I’m at the bottom tier, who cares? All I need to be happy is to make sure she’s not gonna be too antisocial when she grows up…” Sans pauses himself as he knocks on the door, “Besides, I’m sure that by the end of the night, she’ll enjoy herself.”

Soon, both hear the call of Mikoto, as she makes her way to greet her guests.

* * *

In the lone field behind her house, Sasuke stood, panting, as she struggled with training. All day, she had been here, attempting to replicate a training exorcise that Itachi had showed her, with little success. She had thrown countless kunai, in so many different velocities, yet she was about as close as when she started.

She dropped to the ground, her teeth clenched and hand so tight, her knuckles turned white, and a growl escaped her tightly sealed teeth, _‘Why is this so hard!? Itachi used another kunai to knock it into the target, but no matter what I do, IT ISN’T WORKING!’_

Suddenly, she paused and crossed her arms, remembering Sans’ advice about keeping her anger in check, and decided to try out her breathing exorcises. Slowly, she felt her immediate anger alleviate, she could still feel the constant anger in her heart, but the focus began to shift to thoughts of tranquility. Her mind wandered toward her family: Her father was strict and forceful, and seemed rather distant from anyone, even her mother, but… she still felt his gaze when he thought she wasn’t paying attention… he cared, even if it was in a strange way. Her mother, on the other hand, was the complete opposite, so caring and passionate… it felt like she could do no wrong. She was nothing but motherly to all, and it was honestly one of the thing that Sasuke loved most about her.

Finally, was her brother… Itachi was her favorite person in the whole world, with very, very few who could even come close to his pedestal. He was literally the greatest shinobi ever in her mind, and she was constantly being compared to him, so it wasn’t very hard to realize that she had a brother complex. But at the same time… she kind of hated him… Just because of how everyone always looked up at him, and down at her…

She sighed to herself, _‘It’s not Nii-_ _san_ _’s fault… but…’_ It was so, absolutely annoying to constantly be looked at in comparison to someone else… but there was _one_ person who didn’t judge her solely as Itachi’s little sister…

Her sensei, Sans. In all honesty, she hand literally no idea what to think about him. He was so goofy

and lazy, but… he was clearly very strong if both Itachi and _FATHER,_ who was one of the biggest critics of strength, wanted him to be her teacher, and yet… he never taught her anything. Well… he taught her, just only various bits of science, math, and even refining her skills, he never even trained her in taijutsu, even though he was going to be the physical education teacher in the academy. But despite everything, he was…

… Hmm… thinking about it now, the words elude her. He was… infuriating… annoying… but… so, so cool. She’d never actually say it to his face, but he was insanely smart and strong, if what she heard from Itachi is right, but he just took life so easy… like a leaf in a stream. Despite the hardships of his life, he just chugs along… Thinking about it now, she felt a tad jealous of her teacher, but she longed for the day she could be strong enough to take it so slow.

She was quickly brought out of her mind, when she heard a call from the house, “Sasuke! Shisui-kun and Sans-kun are here!”

Sasuke’s face quickly gained a smirk, leave it to Sans-sensei to pop up right when he’s being talked about. She then stood up and patted the dirt off her clothes, “Coming, Mother!”


End file.
